I recently did a fresh install of KDE Manjaro (switching from Gnome).
This is a desktop build, I have been using KDE manjaro for a week now.
Well, everything was running smoothly (with some minor hiccups I was able to fix) up until today.
I tried booting on Manjaro and I noticed that the Ethernet adapter does not want to work.
It was working until yesterday, and to be honest I don’t remember upgrading anything yesterday.
When I log into the system the ethernet connection tries to load and gives me the
“ip configuration was unavailable” error.
Internet works fine on other OSs and on my laptop, so it doesn’t have anything to do with the connection.
My inxi -Nazy output is:
Network:
Device-1: Intel Ethernet I217-V vendor: ASUSTeK driver: e1000e v: 3.2.6-k
port: f020 bus ID: 00:19.0 chip ID: 8086:153b
Device-2: TP-Link UE300 10/100/1000 LAN (ethernet mode) [Realtek RTL8153]
type: USB driver: r8152 bus ID: 4-5:2 chip ID: 2357:0601 serial:
The second device is a usb to ethernet dongle that I currently use to access the internet.
I am terrible at solving network related issues.
I’ve tried enabling dhcpcd.service to no avail.
What is your used kernel version?
Have you tried other kernels?
What is the output of sudo dmesg -l emerg,alert,crit,err,warn when yoiu try to use the intel ethernet adapter?
I forgot to mention that the problem appeared without me explicitly changing kernels.
I use the default kernel that came with my release.
Or at least I think I do.
Manjaro 20.2 ships with 5.8 if I am not mistaken.
Perhaps it ships with 5.7 and it automatically changed the kernel version through updating?
I will try 5.7 and get back to you.
Ethernet adapter seems to work well on 5.7.19-2 kernel
uname -r
5.7.19-2-MANJARO
I am using the ethernet connection to post this.
I guess the system automatically switched to the 5.8 kernel and something is wrong with the ethernet configuration there.
As I mentioned above, I did not explicitly switch kernels.
Maybe I did not pay enough attention to the update process?
Can Manjaro change the default kernel automatically?
Perhaps I logged into 5.8 by accident (for example, through GRUB).
For all intents and purposes, my current problem is solved.
However, if I want to change kernels I will probably face some problems.
You should mind that 5.7 is not a LTS Kernel and as such will stop receiving support in a while. So you should test with the 5.4 LTS Kernel. In any case it is always recommended to have 2 Kernels installed to be able to switch, if problems arise.
I also tried kernel 5.4, to no avail.
I am getting consistent behavior on all kernels, so it is not a kernel thing.
I forgot to mention that this is a dualboot system (Manjaro KDE - Windows 10).
As I was searching for solutions online, I found a thread that mentioned that Windows may be hijacking the Ethernet interface via its “Fast boot” option that essentially never fully shuts the system down.
I am familiar with how Windows may “lock” hard drives via this option (and not letting Linux mount said drives), however I never thought that this would also interfere with the Ethernet adapter.
Moreover, I’ve never experienced this issue before and this is not the first time I am dual booting.
Anyway, I went into Windows and disabled fast boot (even though Ethernet worked properly for a full week before it stopped working - with Windows fast boot on that is - ), just to check.
I fully shut down Windows and booted into Manjaro.
And the ethernet adapter worked!
Hooray!
But guess what?
No.
On next boot it still doesn’t work.
It is kinda frustrating, ain’t it?
Ninja p.s.
Same ethernet behavior occurs even on live USB!
Tested on the very same Live USB image I used to install the system!
Ethernet also does not work on other live USBs!!
Windows is more than likely the culprit here.
I cannot imagine a sensible reason why ethernet would not work even on live USBs.
Probably some recent update messed something up?
However I don’t recall updating Windows around that time (I could be wrong, though).
Now that you mention it, the ethernet adapter on my system always breaks after I’ve logged into Windows.
I use both OSs on a daily basis and when I manage to fix linux (by pure chance), the next time I log in (which will more than likely be after also booting on Windows) the ethernet is broken again.
As you can see by this thread, I’ve been facing this problem for 3-4 days now.
When it works it is purely random.
@SlapGas
Could you both run a test regimen to establish the source of the problem by exclusion?
Do each of those steps alone and see if anything changes.
Turn of the PC and leave it turned off for 5 minutes. Then turn on again.
Do the same with the router.
Hard configure the IP addresses in the router and the devices.
This is for sure a very curious behaviour you both are describing here.
For once, I can safely guarantee you that step 1 does not work; I turn the PC off every night and power it on the next afternoon (when I get back home from work). Thus it remains powered off for like 16-17 hours.
I will give a shot at restarting the router and configuring the IP manually (I’m gonna be pretty rusty on the latter, it’s been a while since I had to manually set up and internet connection).
I did not turn “fast boot” off in BIOS and, to be honest, I don’t even know if it is on or off right now.
What I do know though is that I certainly did not change anything in BIOS when the problem appeared.
Reboot into Windows --> Ethernet always works there
Reboot into Manjaro --> Ethernet broken
So, the problem appears after logging into Windows.
Fun fact:
Yesterday evening around 2 a.m. we had a minor power outage here in the neighborhood.
Not too long, probably was around 5 minutes.
I was finishing some stuff when the power went out.
So I figured I’d call it a day.
This afternoon when I came back from work and logged into linux, guess what happened?
Ethernet was working fine.
This means that the power outage was someway/somehow able to “reset” the whole issue.
So I used this opportunity to work on linux, reinstall some stuff etc etc.
I rebooted many times from linux to linux, not a single problem.
As soon as I booted into Windows (for like 20 seconds) and rebooted into linux, ethernet broke again.
I fully shut down the PC, waited for like 5 minutes and then logged into linux again.
Ethernet still broken.
Fully shut down the PC and the router, opened them up and then logged into linux.
Ethernet still broken.
The only thing I did not try thus far (in hopes of “mimicking” the power outage) is switching off the PSU and taking the power cable off.
Read through that thread and tried replacing the ethernet cable.
I have 3 different ethernet cables, which all work on Windows.
Tested all 3, the connection problem was not fixed.
I also tried different router ports, with similar results.
The only thing that “works” reliably thus far is shutting off the PSU.
The problem persists, I haven’t been able to figure out what’s wrong.
The only way I am able to get ethernet to work on Linux is by shutting off the PSU for a couple minutes after I have logged into Windows.
This way, I am able to get normal ethernet connection on Linux.
It’s kinda annoying, but at least it is something simple that does the trick.
Would love to find out what’s causing the problem though.