I assume the syslog will be stored in the log folder on the flash drive after startup and I can just copy that file...

 

No, standard unRAID will not write any logfile to the flash drive.

 

While the system is running, the log is found at /var/log/syslog but this is a memory disk in RAM.  As soon as the system shuts down or is rebooted, the logfile is lost.

OK, got it so I'll need to log in on the machine and manually copy the log over.

probably won't have time to get to it until next week.

Hey Squidly, I guess it's your NIC after all.........

Argh, it turns out that the spare NIC I had was a D-Link DGE-528T not an Intel as I first thought. As per http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=25008.msg217232#msg217232 it is actually a Realtek 8169 and it doesn't work...at all. Bl**dy Realtek, all my mobo's have them and so now do these cards...I even have TWO of these D-Link's. It seems like another order is required for a kosher Intel NIC. Any other options?

Taken from [sOLVED] thread: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=29203.0

I ran across that thread previously when i first encountered this issue.

 

Long story is I was running RC5 (I think that's what I was on) for a while, then a couple weeks back I tried upgrading to the latest RC as I wanted to play with VirtualBox on Unraid.  NIC didn't come up.  So I reverted back to the next RC up from 5, NIC went down.  Then I incremented up from 5-13, I found the NIC didn't work on most but it came up on some, I lost track of which ones.  Obviously if you follow along the release notes there are issues with the Realtek NIC kernel drives vs. Realtek supplied and the RC were back and forth.  I read the whole story.  I found RC13 was the latest that worked. I was hoping 5 stable would reinstate support, unfortunately it didn't. Is there a plan to address in an update or should I just buy new equipment now?

I ran across that thread previously when i first encountered this issue.

 

Long story is I was running RC5 (I think that's what I was on) for a while, then a couple weeks back I tried upgrading to the latest RC as I wanted to play with VirtualBox on Unraid.  NIC didn't come up.  So I reverted back to the next RC up from 5, NIC went down.  Then I incremented up from 5-13, I found the NIC didn't work on most but it came up on some, I lost track of which ones.  Obviously if you follow along the release notes there are issues with the Realtek NIC kernel drives vs. Realtek supplied and the RC were back and forth.  I read the whole story.  I found RC13 was the latest that worked. I was hoping 5 stable would reinstate support, unfortunately it didn't. Is there a plan to address in an update or should I just buy new equipment now?

 

I think the main issue is that some realtek NIC's work with Realtek supplied drivers and some (ironically) don't. This back and forth game keeps happening and honestly who know when it might get resolves.  Realtek might finally release a driver that works for all the products that they make/made.  Sometime the best driver is that built into the kernel and sometimes it is the ones supplied by Realtek.

 

Your best option is to go with some Intel based NIC.  They tend to be the best supported overall.

Except that I am running a Mini-ITX board with one PCI slot that is used by a SATA card, which all fits into a nice, small computer case.

So I'd either need to remove the option to use more drives by replacing the SATA with an Intel NIC, or just get a more modern board with more SATA headers and/or preferably with Intel NIC on board.  I really liked the fact that I was able to run Unraid on low cost $60 MOBO/CPU.

 

Any suggestions on hardware that fits the bill? I don't need it to be a hotrod. Probably a mini-itx board/i3 combo..

 

I also have a mini-ITX board with a Realtek NIC (8111E).  Fortunately, I have never had NIC issues with unRaid.  Currently, I am running v5 beta 15c. I have not upgraded to v5 final simply because I have not been home to do it since v5 final was released in late August.  When I started with unRAID in December of 2011, I think the first version I installed was v5 beta 6.  I have never had NIC problems on any unRAID release since then.

 

Since, like me, you have a mini-ITX board with only one PCIE slot occupied by a SATA III card, have you considered the following?:

 

http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-Gigabit-Ethernet-Network-Adapter/dp/B0095EFXMC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1380468929&sr=8-1&keywords=startech+usb3+gigabit+nic

 

My MB has USB 3 ports and you ought to be able to get decent NIC speed from this if you have a USB 3 port.  If I ever have NIC problems, I will give this adapter a try. It claims to have Linux drivers and many have reported success with it and a Linux OS.  I have no idea if it works with unRaid/Slackware.

I have finally had the chance to upgrade to Unraid 5.0 today.  I backed  up my Flash Drive, reformatted it, copied the 5.0 package to as well as my config directory, ran Make_bootable, and restarted.  I then installed the web gui and unmenu.  My cache_dirs seems to have been already installed, so I left that alone.

 

All seems to be working well.  The new interface is excellent.

 

thanks, Tom. 

@squidly,

You may have already seen this thread, http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=29571.0, but it covers compiling your own driver for your NIC. In this case it was Antheros and not RealTek. I wish I could say it's an easy task, but the OP worked through the instructions provided by user WalterB and got his working. Maybe it can work for you.

Thanks for the suggestion but I'd rather not spend my time figuring out how to compile a kernel, as much as I like learning new things it just not time well spent for me right now.  I'll just live with RC13 for now and wait until Realtek resolves it or the Linux kernel drivers can handle it....or just buy new hardware if its that important for me to start playing with VirtualBox on Unraid.

This really sounds like a problem that is out of the hands of the Unraid developers. If I wasn't using the free version I'd be disappointed, but until then I'll just be happy with what I'm running.  Let's see if Realtek and/or the Linux people can figure it out.  Frustrating when it jumps back and forth between working and not working though.

 

 

Just completed upgrades to two unRaid boxes from 4.7 to 5. Everything went smoothly except I have been bitten by the Realtek NIC bug. Both have mobos with Realtek LAN built-in. Both are showing Network: eth0: 100Mb/s - Full Duplex. I assume I had gigabit before with 4.7 but maybe not ?

 

ASUS M4A785-M with 8112L

Biostar A880GZ with 8111E

 

 

Rather than hassle with these on again off again drivers, can anyone recommend known good NICs that I can stuff in there and get proper network speed?

I can tell you that I have similar realtek nic (and know there are many other users on forum with similar or exactly same chips...) with no problems at all with drivers Tom included on latest unraid rc's... I can get (and max out) 1gbps... I would check cables and switch...

hmmmm.... found newest server was plugged into the FIOS modem switch (must be 100 mbs?). Plugging that into main GB switch brought it up to speed. Swapped cables on the other older server and it shows 1000 now too.

okay now I come back two hours later and one (older server) is back to 100

Network: eth0: 100Mb/s - Full Duplex

If you truely want to try a new nic then get an Intel based nic.

I was thinking of buying a new nic addon card that has two intel gig ports, and just disable my onboard port.  Can anyone recommend a dual port intel nic addon card?

 

I'm looking at this one made by Intel,

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=bsd&cs=04&sku=A2165191&ST=pla&dgc=ST&cid=262075&lid=4742361&acd=12309152537461010

 

is anyone running v5 and this card with success?

I posted earlier that all is well with my server, but I think now I am seeing some problems with the reatek nic.  I have seen this only intermittently in the past but now am seeing it on nearly every copy.

 

Copying files from a Win7 x64 box to my server, there is a delay from at least 15 sec up to 2 min or more, when the dialog box says "calculating" and nothing happens.  During this period, samba is unresponsive - whether I click on the target directory or attempt to otherwise navigate the directory structure using my Win7 box, nothing happens.  I see a similar thing with the web gui - there is a delay of 10s of seconds at times to reload a page - often though the delay is only 1 or two seconds.

 

What do you think - is this likely the realtek nic or is it perhaps an artifact of the new webgui?

Some seconds delay may happen when you try to copy files to a near full hdd on unraid server... it's filesystem work to try to allocate proper space for new file... can it be the case?  It will never happen when copying from unraid. Anyway you also talk about delays on webgui and that may be something else.

Are the disks spinning up?

I upgraded to 5.0 just over a month ago and while streaming a video from it the other night I lost connectivity. Tried the basics, er reboot but still unable to communicate with it. I don't normally keep a monitor connected so I connected one and the system boots up and goes past the BIOS but then I get to just a flashing cursor and no response from any keystrokes. I pulled the USB and plugged into my other PC and all the files are listed so that seems to be fine. Any ideas on what I could try next?

I upgraded to 5.0 just over a month ago and while streaming a video from it the other night I lost connectivity. Tried the basics, er reboot but still unable to communicate with it. I don't normally keep a monitor connected so I connected one and the system boots up and goes past the BIOS but then I get to just a flashing cursor and no response from any keystrokes. I pulled the USB and plugged into my other PC and all the files are listed so that seems to be fine. Any ideas on what I could try next?

 

Can you run a memtest off the flash drive? Otherwise it's probably best to rebuild your flash drive with a clean copy of 5.0 (no plugins, etc.) and try again. Also check all of the connections to your drives and motherboard, a loose cable can sometimes cause funny hangs.

Looks like I might have the issue isolated down to my cable modem. New one on the way.

just to followup to the realtek (onboard) network issue stuck at 100 Mbps, Ordered Intel EXPI9301CTBLK Network Adapter 10/100/1000Mbps PCI-Express 1 x RJ45 frok Newegg. Installed today (disabled onboard) and it cam right up at 1000 Mbps. Could be placebo effect but it seems to boot faster too.

Just so we are comparing apples to apples, what utility are you guys using to read network performance (copy speeds)?

 

I'm running a Win7 64bit with a single gig port, going to a cisco switch to my unraid (both are plugged into the same switch).  I'm using SMB and the nics on both my Win 7 box and unraid are Realtek. 

 

I use Total Commander to move files around and that tells me the speed during the copy - real time.

 

I just tested my setup and I used a mkv movie file about 7gb in size.  The copy from Win7 to unraid gets me 60,000 kbytes/s

Going from my unraid to my Win 7 gets me 116,000 kbytes/s

 

I have Intel nics on order to see if things improve, although the copy from the unraid is close to max.  If there is a better way to capture network performance, please share.

You can use 'iftop' on unraid, you can get Slackware package from:

http://slackware.cs.utah.edu/pub/linuxpackages/Slackware-12.0/Console/iftop/iftop-0.17-i486-1kan.tgz

(if you want values on Bytes/s run 'iftop -B')

 

Anyway I did already compared and speed values are similar on iftop on unraid and on w7 copy window.