GigabitX58 Chipset limiting performance to 200-300 Mbits over a gigabit link
GigabitX58 Chipset limiting performance to 200-300 Mbits over a gigabit link
About two weeks back I placed a GbT connection from my ISP. Everything functioned properly, set up the FRITZ!Box and ran some speed tests on a few PCs. For clarity: The FRITZ!Box resides in the living room alongside one other PC (with an X58 chipset), a PiHole, and a few other minor gadgets. The first PC supports GbT and operates flawlessly. Then a 20-meter Cat5e cable made its way to the opposite side of the apartment into an EdgeRouter X (ERX) which hosts two PCs and additional devices. Motherboards for the three PCs: Living room PC: MSI X58 Pro-E; PC1: ASUS Sabertooth X58; PC2: ASUS P6X58D-E. All support native GbT and drivers are current. Now the issue: PCs 1 and 2 are capped at 200–300 Mbits. All network configurations are correct, set to 1Gbit/Full. I discovered that the ERX has an offloading feature that must be turned on to achieve higher speeds. That fix helped PC2 but not PC1, causing the internet speed to drop to 200–300 Mbits even with the offloading enabled. After a couple of days, testing showed the speeds returning to normal despite the settings. Now it appears the offloading functions aren’t making a difference, yet I still leave them active. Then I swapped in a USB 3.0 Ethernet adapter on PC1—it worked perfectly, while doing the same on PC2 failed. Eventually, I plugged a notebook into both PCs’ connections and instantly achieved GbT speeds. This suggests something is wrong with the internal NIC. Additional details: Both PCs report drivers at full speed, CPU usage stays steady, neither is overclocked, and I’ve tried increasing voltage and lowering base clock without success. Using a Debian VM didn’t help. I replaced the cable to directly link PC2 to the FRITZ!Box, which restored GbT performance. So it seems the internal hardware might be faulty. Some other notes: Prior to the GbT upgrade, my 400Mbit connection worked flawlessly. Now it barely reaches 400Mbit. The key clue was using a notebook at either PC’s port—it resolved everything. This points toward an internal issue with the network cards.
You've already tried several approaches and encountered issues. The speed test results seemed unreliable, and you mentioned problems accessing cache files during installation. It might be related to the system's memory or file system handling. Consider checking your RAM usage and ensuring there are no conflicts with other processes. If you're still stuck, try using a different tool or consult the Debian documentation for more specific troubleshooting steps.
Set up Debian on a hard drive partition and successfully ran it. Now I’m looking for ways to strip network-related stuff from Windows before reinstalling. Please suggest options I should consider.
I attempted to reinstall drivers multiple times, reset the system through Windows and the command prompt, but nothing changed. You might want to try a different approach—such as resetting network settings or booting into safe mode—to see if that resolves the issue.