Hi folks,

I had something happen today that has left all of us scratching our heads.  Before 
working on a friend's XP machine that has an ASUS P5LD2-X/1333 mobo, I used Macrium 
Reflect Free to image her hard drive.  

After imaging, and before changing anything on the machine, I wanted to make sure 
that the system would boot using Macrium's Linux-based rescue CD and that it would 
see the image I made on a USB disk drive in case I had to restore the image, so I 
rebooted the system with this rescue disk and it booted fine and it showed the image 
backup existing on the USB drive, so I didn't proceed any further - that's all I 
wanted to verify, (i.e., I didn't do any restore) and rebooted back to XP.

After reboot into XP, it said the network cable was disconnected.  Absolutely nothing 
else in the system showed any problems and I went through the usual troubleshooting 
for ethernet controllers.  

This ethernet controller is actually an on-board component, "Atheros L2 Fast Ethernet 
10/100 Base-T Controller" not a PCI card device.  It was still enabled in BIOS.  
The cable was fine, the router was fine.  I uninstalled the driver and had XP reinstall 
it when it found "new hardware" upon reboot.  It still showed in device manager as 
everything was fine.  There were no "link" or "activity" LEDs illuminated beside 
the port on the back of the machine, and the router did not show any, either, for 
that connection.  Dead.

I had to go out and buy a new NIC card and install it to get network access back. 
 It was quite embarrasing and I think my friend thinks I broke it.

Ok, so how could booting a small Linux app bring down an on-board ethernet controller? 
 People that I've asked so far are saying that they think there was actually a hardware 
failure and it was a coincidence that it happened when I touched the machine.  I've 
seen strange things happen, but this is the strangest.

What do you think?  Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Tip: Run a free scan for common Windows errors ad

re: Bizarre Ethernet Controller Failure Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 6:09 am Posted by Ricer46 (23825 messages posted) It's a coincidence. I once replaced a cpu on a mobo, never got near the HD, and low and behold, the HD was dead on reboot. Fortunately the friend never kept any real data. Sometimes the stress of turning off and on a device, can send it over the edge. On Saturday, October 24, 2009 at 9:52 pm, Ed Meadows wrote: >Hi folks, > >I had something happen today that has left all of us scratching our heads. Before >working on a friend's XP machine that has an ASUS P5LD2-X/1333 mobo, I used Macrium >Reflect Free to image her hard drive. > >After imaging, and before changing anything on the machine, I wanted to make sure >that the system would boot using Macrium's Linux-based rescue CD and that it would >see the image I made on a USB disk drive in case I had to restore the image, so I >rebooted the system with this rescue disk and it booted fine and it showed the image >backup existing on the USB drive, so I didn't proceed any further - that's all I >wanted to verify, (i.e., I didn't do any restore) and rebooted back to XP. > >After reboot into XP, it said the network cable was disconnected. Absolutely nothing >else in the system showed any problems and I went through the usual troubleshooting >for ethernet controllers. > >This ethernet controller is actually an on-board component, "Atheros L2 Fast Ethernet >10/100 Base-T Controller" not a PCI card device. It was still enabled in BIOS. >The cable was fine, the router was fine. I uninstalled the driver and had XP reinstall >it when it found "new hardware" upon reboot. It still showed in device manager as >everything was fine. There were no "link" or "activity" LEDs illuminated beside >the port on the back of the machine, and the router did not show any, either, for >that connection. Dead. > >I had to go out and buy a new NIC card and install it to get network access back. > It was quite embarrasing and I think my friend thinks I broke it. > >Ok, so how could booting a small Linux app bring down an on-board ethernet controller? > People that I've asked so far are saying that they think there was actually a hardware >failure and it was a coincidence that it happened when I touched the machine. I've >seen strange things happen, but this is the strangest. > >What do you think? Any thoughts would be appreciated. > >Thanks! > [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Bizarre Ethernet Controller Failure Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 8:42 am Posted by Sysadmin_Ed (112 messages posted) Ricer46, Thanks for your response. So you, too, think Murphy was behind this one! On Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 6:09 am, Ricer46 wrote: >It's a coincidence. I once replaced a cpu on a mobo, never got near the HD, and low >and behold, the HD was dead on reboot. Fortunately the friend never kept any real >data. Sometimes the stress of turning off and on a device, can send it over the edge. > > > [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Bizarre Ethernet Controller Failure Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 10:14 am Posted by Adam Bradley (8787 messages posted) I was giving advice to someone recently on setting up a router, upon setting it up the modem went dead. It was around 8 years old at that point and either the power cycle or the disconnecting and reconnecting of the Ethernet port took it out (he had been manually swapping cables for a while before this), so he now has a working network but has to buy a new modem. Got to love Murphy. On Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 8:42 am, Ed Meadows wrote: >Ricer46, > >Thanks for your response. So you, too, think Murphy was behind this one! > > > [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Bizarre Ethernet Controller Failure Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 10:46 am Posted by Sysadmin_Ed (112 messages posted) Thanks, Adam. Murphy is heartless and loves older hardware :^) On Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 10:14 am, Adam Bradley wrote: >I was giving advice to someone recently on setting up a router, upon setting it up >the modem went dead. It was around 8 years old at that point and either the power >cycle or the disconnecting and reconnecting of the Ethernet port took it out (he >had been manually swapping cables for a while before this), so he now has a working >network but has to buy a new modem. Got to love Murphy. > > [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Bizarre Ethernet Controller Failure Saturday, December 12, 2009 at 9:54 am Posted by Spiral (2 messages posted) Coincidence...? Well here I have a eee PC 701 with on-board Atheros L2 etc etc. Recently tried a couple of Linux Live distros on USB stick as they are always being raved about. One of them didn't want to use the wireless so I plugged in hard-wired Ethernet and it worked fine. When I Re-booted to Windows 2000 sp4, which is on the SDD of the eee PC, behold: the Ethernet is apparently dead, although Windows just says it is disconnected. No lights on the router though :-( Have I just trashed Ethernet on my eeePC..? On Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 10:46 am, Sysadmin_Ed wrote: >Thanks, Adam. Murphy is heartless and loves older hardware :^) > > > [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Bizarre Ethernet Controller Failure Monday, December 14, 2009 at 3:22 pm Posted by Spiral (2 messages posted) Quick follow-up: Sorted the problem by shutting down and removing all power-source to the machine for a while. Re-started and Ethernet was working in Windows again. Very strange. May try changing Windows LAN chipset drivers again... On Saturday, December 12, 2009 at 9:54 am, Spiral wrote: >Coincidence...? Well here I have a eee PC 701 with on-board Atheros L2 etc etc. [Reply or follow-up to this message] Tip: Use one of the [Reply or follow-up to this message] links above to add a message to this thread Search this forum Start a new thread on a different subject Report abuse of the forum Return to the Windows XP Discussion Forum