TP-LINK TG-3468: A $12 Linux PCI-E Gigabit Network Adapter

[dienteperro]

There is an issue with this network card and Linux, I have filled a bug report (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/1788730), and found this other one for FreeBSD (https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/n...rk-card.57734/) which was solved in 2016. Please be sure to read this before purchase.

[Matt Taggart]

As of 2019-10-03 the TP-Link TG-3468 card being sold on Amazon (using the original link at the beginning of this thread) appears as the following:

01:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller [10ec:8168] (rev 06)

On Debian stretch it fails to work properly with both 4.9 and the 4.19 backport. The r8169 driver claims the device, but

4.9.0-11-amd64 4.9.189-3+deb9u1:

# dmesg|grep r816
[    2.967680] r8169 Gigabit Ethernet driver 2.3LK-NAPI loaded
[    2.968640] r8169 0000:01:00.0 eth0: RTL8168e/8111e at 0xffffb3470064d000, 34:e8:94:d7:b3:ee, XID 0c200000 IRQ 27
[    2.968645] r8169 0000:01:00.0 eth0: jumbo features [frames: 9200 bytes, tx checksumming: ko]
# ethtool eth2
Settings for eth2:
    Supported ports: [ TP MII ]
    Supported link modes:   10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 
                            100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 
                            1000baseT/Half 1000baseT/Full 
    Supported pause frame use: No
    Supports auto-negotiation: Yes
    Advertised link modes:  10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full 
                            100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full 
                            1000baseT/Half 1000baseT/Full 
    Advertised pause frame use: Symmetric Receive-only
    Advertised auto-negotiation: Yes
    Speed: 10Mb/s
    Duplex: Half
    Port: MII
    PHYAD: 0
    Transceiver: internal
    Auto-negotiation: on
    Supports Wake-on: pumbg
    Wake-on: g
    Current message level: 0x00000033 (51)
                   drv probe ifdown ifup
    Link detected: no

(note: 10HDx and no link, despite it being connected to a switch)

4.19.0-0.bpo.6-amd64 4.19.67-2~bpo9+1:

# dmesg|grep r816
[    6.061836] libphy: r8169: probed
[    6.066177] r8169 0000:01:00.0 eth0: RTL8168e/8111e, 34:e8:94:d7:be:bd, XID 2c200000, IRQ 27
[    6.074782] r8169 0000:01:00.0 eth0: jumbo features [frames: 9200 bytes, tx checksumming: ko]
# ethtool eth2
Settings for eth2:
Cannot get device settings: No such device
    Supports Wake-on: pumbg
    Wake-on: g
    Current message level: 0x00000033 (51)
                   drv probe ifdown ifup
    Link detected: no

firmware-realtek installed, but the driver makes no attempt to load firmware.

The box I received looks like the current box on the Amazon images.

[danbob999]

Hi Matt
Am I still likely to have the same bug with Debian 10, kernel 4.19?

Why are you running the command on eth2 when the driver report the r8169 interface to be eth0? It must have been renamed at some point?