Re: [PATCH AUTOSEL 6.10 03/27] r8169: remove detection of chip version 11 (early RTL8168b)

From: Heiner Kallweit
Date: Sun Feb 23 2025 - 04:42:56 EST


On 23.02.2025 01:57, Michael Pflüger wrote:
>> Indeed, I ended up dropping from the wrong local branch yesterday
>
> So it looks like the patch was kept in stable because i hit the problem
> now after upgrading from kernel 6.9 to 6.13. It's a PCIe card which was
> cheaply available in europe so it wouldn't surprise me if some more of
> these are around and in use. So, can we keep supporting that chip and
> revert the change, or do i have to get a new card?
>
Detection of this chip version was removed in May last year and this is
the first such report. So it doesn't seem there's a significant number
of these old cards out there. It was the first PCIe version, and it's
broken in different ways, requiring version-specific workarounds.
I'd prefer not to re-add these workarounds in mainline, also given that
cards with modern versions like RTL8168h are available new for <10€.
Alternatively you can build a custom kernel, or use r8168 vendor driver.

> Regards,
>
> Michael
>
>