Problem with 6.5 kernel and r8168 module

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Apologies. I’m totally new to this forum and wasn’t sure how things work, so I wrote a reply here, then realized that my problem happened with the update from Sept. 13, deleted here, and then realized that the post from the 13th was already closed. I didn’t have time until today, though.

Here’s the previously deleted post…

I have trouble with the r8168 driver since I installed the latest updates.

uname -a
Linux studio 6.5.3-1-MANJARO #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Wed Sep 13 12:21:35 UTC 2023 x86_64 GNU/Linux

sudo modprobe r8168
modprobe: ERROR: could not insert 'r8168': Unknown symbol in module, or unknown parameter (see dmesg)

dmesg:

r8168: version magic '6.5.1-1-MANJARO SMP preempt mod_unload ' should be '6.5.3-1-MANJARO SMP preempt mod_unload '
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Welcome to the forum! :vulcan_salute:

Do you really need the r8168 module? It’s an out-of-tree module from Realtek themselves. Chances are that you’re better off using the in-tree r8169 driver.

Just uninstall linux65-r8168 and make sure you remove the blacklist on r8169 under /etc/modprobe.d. Then reboot, and r8169 should automatically be loaded.

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Thanks a million! That did it.

Funny, though, when I go to the “Hardware configuration” panel in the Manjaro section of KDE system settings, the suggested driver is r8186.

lspci output:
Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 16)

Oh well. It’s working again, main thing in my book. Thanks!

Also, thanks for moving this to the right place.

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Yes, many people have in the past reported problems with r8169, which is why Manjaro defaults to supplying and recommending the r8168 driver from Realtek, but this should actually be changed, because this issue is already several years old, and it only really applies anymore to people who have very old hardware. Even my own system here, which is over 4 years old already, is using r8169 without any problems. :wink:

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I think I had a similar problem with my device.

There was roughly 6 months where 8168 was the better choice but since kernel 6 (rough estimate), the 8169 module works perfectly.

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I reported issue with network-r8168 driver in [Testing Update] 2023-09-11

linux515-r8168 and linux61-r8168 (8.051.02-1) packages fail to load r8168 driver

Latest version (8.051.02-2) also fails to load r8168 driver linux61-r8168 and linux65-r8168

Network:
  Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet
    vendor: ASUSTeK P8 series driver: N/A modules: r8169, r8168 pcie: gen: 1

Users in a similar situation can load r8169 driver without rebooting to reinstate network connection

sudo modprobe r8169

and then use mhwd to uninstall all kernel modules and remove r8169 blacklist

sudo mhwd -r pci network-r8168

Users who need a working r8168 driver can install dkms and AUR driver r8168-dkms

pamac install dkms; pamac build r8168

and blacklist r8169

sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-r8169.conf <<< 'blacklist r8169'
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