[Gloucs] Well-supported PCI gigabit ethernet card recommendations?

[Andrew Oakley]

Availability, affordability, compatibility... pick any two ;-) I'm
having a lot of trouble getting Ubuntu 10.04 or 8.04 to operate a
Pluscom-branded Realtek RTL R8169 PCI gigabit ethernet card in actual
gigabit mode.
 
Can anyone recommend a cheap gigabit PCI card that actually works in
gigabit mode on Debian/Ubuntu?
 
I know the switch, cable and other network nodes are running gigabit, as
I have successfully transferred files between those nodes at well over
25Mbyte/sec with no problem. I've swapped the cables and the switch
ports over, and rebooted the switch, so I know the cable and the switch
aren't the problem.
 
The card autoneotiates at 100Mbit/s but if I use ethtool to force it
into 1000Mbit/s mode, the switch port light flashes slowly as it fails
to negotiate, network traffic fails, and then drops back to 100Mbit/s
after 5-10 seconds.
 
I have tried compiling the drivers from Realtek's website, same result
on both Ubuntu 8.04 and 10.04.
 
I'm particularly after a card that I can purchase locally around
Cheltenham, such as Computer Cellar, Maplins, PC World etc.
 
My lovely new Netgear Stora NAS box isn't going to be much use for
storing 1TB of files if I have to move files around at 100Mbit!
 
Andrew Oakley
Head of Software Development
Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA)
95 Promenade, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL50 1HZ
T 01242 211460  F 01242 211122  W www.hesa.ac.uk
<http://www.hesa.ac.uk/> 
 

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