[Sussex] ethernet goes down

[Desmond Armstrong]

I am puzzling over a problem which is quite consistant

Mandriva 2006.0 official fully updated.
After a random time the ethernet goes down and yet the net applet icon 
says network up and this is obviously wrong.
If I bring up the network monitor it has button 'Connect ethernet'and if 
we press this it does reconnect.
The problem is quite random and very annoying and I am satisfied it is a 
software problem as it is consistantly occuring on many machines.

The only difference I can find between this function on Mandriva 2006.0 
and Mandrake 10.1 is that the user does not have the priviledge to 
disconnect or reconnect the ethernet with 10.1

My fundamental problem is that the net applet is not indicating 
correctly, so now I wonder if this may have something to do with it.