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Q Driverless network

I am a long-time subscriber and I have finally built my dream machine, with plans on running multiboot Linux distros on it. My basic problem is that I can’t connect to a network, or obviously the internet, with any Linux distribution. My first choice would be to use Linux Mint, but no luck, so I tried booting from a live USB and tried Ubuntu 22.04 and even Fedora 37.

I really, really want to multiboot Linux Mint, Ubuntu 22.04 and Fedora 37 on the same machine using Ethernet. The network device is a Realtek Gaming 2.5GbE Family Controller running the 10.56.119.220 drive on Windows 10 Pro (rt640X64.sys). I have searched the internet, but I am not having much luck finding Linux drivers for this controller. Frank Gunseor

A Realtek does provide a driver for this card, but it should not be needed with recent Linux kernels because support for it has been added to the r8169 kernel module. The first step is to make sure the module is loaded: $ lsmod | grep 8169

This shows you whether it is in the list of currently loaded modules. If it is not, you need to run: $ sudo modprobe -v r8169

This command should show the r8169 module being loaded – along with any other modules it requires. Now you can check that your network interface is available with: $ ifconfig -a

The -a option is important, it makes Ifconfig show all available interfaces, not just those that are in use. If loading the module does not make the interface appear, check the system log and dmesg. With Systemd, the two are combined so you can run $ sudo journalctl -f in one terminal, to see the new log entries as they are added, then run modprobe in another terminal and watch for errors.

It is possible that you do not have the specific firmware files that the module needs, so also make sure the linuxfirmware package is installed, because it contains these.

You can also find more information with a hardware discovery tool. Most desktops have a graphical system information display, or you can run the following in a terminal: $ sudo lspci -k

The -k option makes Lspci show the kernel modules in use by each device. If no module is shown for your network card, no driver has been loaded and the card is unavailable. On-board devices still use the PCI bus, so this command shows built-in network adaptors, too.