Network Slow after Package update, SuSE 8 i386

[Stephen1268]

After running an automatic package update, the network is running slow. Intenet says...Resolving host.... for a long time.

I tried updating the Broadcom 5700 from bcm5700 to tg3, but that didn't change anything. HP SuSE installation notes potential trouble with the bcm5700.

Anyone provide help on this issue? I'm a newbie.

[Vitaly Karasik_1]

are your NIC running in full duplex mode?

you can check it with ethtool/mii-tool or in /var/log/messages

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello Stephen,

two things, if name resolution is taking very long you might have a problem reaching your Bind server. Check your settings (yast2->Network devices->Network card). Check if the bind server is reachable (e.g. ping). As for the bcm5700 vs. tg3 driver it is my understanding from discussions here in the forums that depending on your card you either need the bcm5700 <> the tg3, but for a given card they are not interchangable. Search the forums for further information.

Greetings, Martin

[Vernon Brown_4]

I had a similar problem when upgrading to SuSE 9; in my case it was the /etc/resolv.conf file. /etc/resolv.conf needs to point to your fastest name server. I'm running BIND on my server so my fastest is 127.0.0.1 or localhost.
search localhost
nameserver 127.0.0.1
nameserver (my ISP provided nameserver)

[Stephen1268]

Thanks for the feedback. NIC appears to be in full duplex mode.

I appear to be reaching the Bind Server. Ping is successful, but it's slow. From reading other posts, the bcm5700 driver is better than tg3.

I'm running on ADSL, Static IP. Gateway and DNS both point to an Earthlink IP address.

I have Windows 2003 running on another partition so I can download files quickly, otherwise it takes forever. I'm still learning...

[Vitaly Karasik_1]

any eth errors in ifconfig and/or dmesg/messages?

[Stephen1268]

No error messages noted.

[Vitaly Karasik_1]

if I understand you properly and we have slow ftp download, it doesn't seem to be related to DNS problem - ftp uses DNS only once.

So it seems to be related to NIC configuration.

To say the true, I don't have enough experience with SUSE; RH Linux, for example, in 99% cases saves configuration files when upgrading packages.

Probably you did some non-standart network setting [MTU, for example], and that settings were overwrited during upgrade?

BTW, do you have LAN too? Whant about networking inside your LAN? is it slow too?

[Steven E. Protter]

If your ISP allows it(mine no longer does) a traceroute might be useful to find the bottleneck.

traceroute yahoo.com

This will show you every hop from your local machine to yahoo.

The slow local hops and how long it takes the name to resolve will tell you exactly where to look.

There could be an incompatability between the SuSe networking and the ios of a router. Since the trigger appeared to be a SuSe update that is the best place to look.

Perhaps there is a new fix on Suse or HP website. I'd take the time to report the symptoms to HP and to Suse(which this thread does not do).

SEP

[Stephen1268]

I'm not running a LAN at the moment.

I haven't found any answers or documentation for this problem from HP and SuSE. SuSE email support had me email settings and change the network card to tg3. I haven't contacted HP email support. Their documentation mentions using their driver.

I would think someone running SuSE 8 SLES on a ProLiant ML350 would have reported the same problem.

On some documentation from SuSE, it says to lower MTU to 1400m but I think mine is fine.

I re-installed to the default package and it's running fine now, but I don't have any package updates.

I'm really new to Linux. My bg is Mac/Win so this is a big learning curve for me. Like flying in the dark.

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello,

since you are back to a working config one way
to track down the issue is to apply one update patch after another, checking after each if the system still performs well.

As for backups, SuSE keeps them in /var/adm/backup/rpmdb/ . So, if it is a hosed config file you should be able to find the difference there.

Greetings, Martin

[Stephen1268]

Great idea. The thought crossed my mind.It's obvious it's some upgrade issue. I'm sure they will find the fix after SuSE 9 SLES comes out.

The upgrade does fix my shut-down problem where the ML350 hangs. Supposedly thats a error due to the kernel with Xeon Hyperthreading where it thinks they are two processors and there aren't (although I could've two). Standard kernel doesn't work on this machine though. I know this is another posting topic.

[Stephen1268]

The UnitedLinux 2.0 update is what caused the problem. The upgrade also caused an error message upon installation.