If any of you have installed a network card in your system I'm wondering if you had to install any kind of driver or issue any kind of command line  When booting. I have an Intel gigabit desktop adapter EXPI9301CT and can't get it to link up. Perhaps I have a bad card?  I have turned off the built-in network connection on the motherboard using BIOS.

I added a Intel Pro 100/1000 (sorry, don't have the exact model # offhand) PCIx card and didn't have to do anything other than disable the onboard in the bios.  Do you see the card being initialized in the syslog?  Here's the network portion of mine:

 

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage kernel: e1000 0000:02:16.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22 (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage kernel: e1000: 0000:02:16.0: e1000_probe: (PCI:33MHz:32-bit) 00:02:b3:b1:d0:ac (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage kernel: e1000: eth0: e1000_probe: Intel® PRO/1000 Network Connection (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage logger: /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1:  /sbin/ifconfig lo 127.0.0.1 (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage logger: /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1:  /sbin/route add -net 127.0.0.0 netmask 255.0.0.0 lo (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage ifplugd(eth0)[1249]: ifplugd 0.28 initializing. (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage ifplugd(eth0)[1249]: Using detection mode: SIOCETHTOOL (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage ifplugd(eth0)[1249]: Initialization complete, link beat not detected. (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:17 Storage kernel: e1000: eth0 NIC Link is Up 1000 Mbps Full Duplex, Flow Control: RX/TX (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:18 Storage ifplugd(eth0)[1249]: Link beat detected. (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage ifplugd(eth0)[1249]: Executing '/etc/ifplugd/ifplugd.action eth0 up'. (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage logger: /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1:  /sbin/ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:50:8D:91:70:39 (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage logger: /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1:  /sbin/ifconfig eth0 192.168.10.143 broadcast 192.168.10.255 netmask 255.255.255.0 (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage logger: /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1:  /sbin/route add default gw 192.168.10.1 metric 1 (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage ifplugd(eth0)[1249]: client: Starting NTP daemon:  /usr/sbin/ntpd -g (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage ntpd[1983]: Listening on interface #0 wildcard, 0.0.0.0#123 Disabled (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage ntpd[1983]: Listening on interface #1 lo, 127.0.0.1#123 Enabled (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage ntpd[1983]: Listening on interface #2 eth0, 192.168.10.143#123 Enabled (Network)

Apr 23 14:42:19 Storage ifplugd(eth0)[1249]: Program executed successfully. (Network)