Bug 2526

Summary: Slow network with kernel 2.6.5
Product: Drivers Reporter: Peter Kerwien (peter)
Component: NetworkAssignee: Jeff Garzik (jgarzik)
Status: CLOSED PATCH_ALREADY_AVAILABLE    
Severity: normal    
Priority: P2    
Hardware: i386   
OS: Linux   
Kernel Version: 2.6.5 Subsystem:
Regression: --- Bisected commit-id:

Description Peter Kerwien 2004-04-16 13:46:40 UTC 
Distribution: Gentoo Linux 2004.0
Hardware Environment: Pentium III 650 MHz, ASUS P2B-F motherboard, 3Com 905C-TX-M
Software Environment:
Problem Description: 

When I switched from kernel 2.4.25 to a 2.6.5 kernel, my network became horribly
slow in one direction (uploading to my server). I'm having a 3Com NIC in the
server so I'm using the 3c59x driver.

With the old kernel I get almost full 100 Mbps throughput during FTP transfers,
both downloading from the server and during upload, but with the 2.6.5 kernel I
get full bandwidth during download but only around 200-300 kbps during upload.

I have seen similiar reports e.g.:

http://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2119

but I don't know what patches SuSE has included i their kernels, because I have
never experienced this in a 2.4.x kernel, only in the 2.6 series.

Please tell me what more information you need.

Steps to reproduce:

Compile and install a kernel with the 3c59x driver. Measure the bandwidth on the
LAN when uploading and downloading files to this machine.
Comment 1 Peter Kerwien 2004-04-16 13:49:22 UTC 
Additional info:

When I replaced my 3Com card with a Netgear (natsemi driver), I realize full
bandwidth again if both directions.
Comment 2 j.taimr 2004-04-17 02:28:52 UTC 
I hit the same problem. Symptoms: at 100baseTx-FD (on fully stable network) is
transfer speed with 2.6.5 kernel cca 100 kb/s. Kernel 2.4.26 has >1 MB/s at the
same conditions. The number of Rx errors and overruns is increasing
monotonously, when 3Com card is in 100 MB mode. If forced to 10baseT-FD with
mii-tool, everything is ok. again, and speed immediately increases back to >1
MB/s, the increase of errors and overruns stops.Distribution: Gentoo Linux
2004.0, Hw: Athlon XP-3000+, Abit NF7-S 2.0 mainboard, 3Com 905C NIC.
Comment 3 Alexander Nyberg 2004-12-07 01:54:46 UTC 
In mail exchange both Peter and Jan report problem solved around 2.6.7, closing.