#36 Acer G43T-AM3 Onboard Ethernet Not Working

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opened 2 years ago by bargolicious · 3 comments

As the title says. The LED on the connector lights up, but it is undetectable to every OS I've tried including Linux Mint, Devuan, Artix, Parabola, and Guix.

As the title says. The LED on the connector lights up, but it is undetectable to every OS I've tried including Linux Mint, Devuan, Artix, Parabola, and Guix.
Leah Rowe commented 2 years ago
Owner

this is expected behaviour, though i've not yet documented this board on libreboot (it's on TODO), even though ROMs are available

this board uses an ICH10 southbridge, with an intel flash descriptor, PHY module and ME

in libreboot, no-ME is done by simply not having an intel flash descriptor. with this, the board is booting up in descriptorless mode. this results in the Intel ME being disabled (and libreboot does not include any firmware for it), but the intel phy module requires an intel flash descriptor and gbe nvm region in flash, to configure it; since your board boots in descriptorless mode, that means no onboard ethernet (which depends on the aforementioned intel phy module)

since the machine does work in descriptorless mode, it might be possible to create a tool like ich9gen, that generates a descriptor+gbe image with the intel ME disabled in the flash descriptor (instead of having the ME disabled by virtue of not having a descriptor in the first place)

in descriptorless mode, ICH10 behaves very similarly to ICH7. afaik this was the last intel platform that could do that

anyway, i'm closing this since it's not technically a bug. use an add-on PCI-E network card

this is expected behaviour, though i've not yet documented this board on libreboot (it's on TODO), even though ROMs are available this board uses an ICH10 southbridge, with an intel flash descriptor, PHY module and ME in libreboot, no-ME is done by simply not having an intel flash descriptor. with this, the board is booting up in descriptorless mode. this results in the Intel ME being disabled (and libreboot does not include any firmware for it), but the intel phy module requires an intel flash descriptor and gbe nvm region in flash, to configure it; since your board boots in descriptorless mode, that means no onboard ethernet (which depends on the aforementioned intel phy module) since the machine does work in descriptorless mode, it might be possible to create a tool like ich9gen, that generates a descriptor+gbe image with the intel ME disabled in the flash descriptor (instead of having the ME disabled by virtue of not having a descriptor in the first place) in descriptorless mode, ICH10 behaves very similarly to ICH7. afaik this was the last *intel* platform that could do that anyway, i'm closing this since it's not technically a bug. use an add-on PCI-E network card
biovoid commented 1 year ago

Is this actually the issue in #125?

Is this actually the issue in #125?
Leah Rowe commented 1 year ago
Owner

already documented.

use macchanger to set mac address.

the board has a incorrect nvm checksum and the bios patches it (vendor one), but coreboot doesn't. it could probably be fixed, but just use macchanger

already documented. use macchanger to set mac address. the board has a incorrect nvm checksum and the bios patches it (vendor one), but coreboot doesn't. it could probably be fixed, but just use macchanger
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