[SOLVED] Missing network drivers

[Rad_00]

Hi,

I have just purchased a brand new motherboard with the following network devices: Intel AX201, RTL8125. Proxmox ISO installer does not contain any drivers for both of them so the installer fails.

I tried installing these drivers on a fresh Debian 10.9 install, but I am missing some dependencies (build-essential, dmks) which I cannot install due to no Internet connection.

I installed Debian 11 which is running the 5.11 kernel and my Internet connection seems to be working fine. Can I install Proxmox on top of it or is it there a better solution to my problem? I don't have any spare PCIe network card and I would prefer to use the onboard devices.

 

[tom]

Do you have any USB nic around?

If yes, install via this one and after the installation switch to our 5.11 kernel.

(You cannot install Proxmox VE 6.x on top of Debian 11. The upcoming Proxmox VE 7.0 will be based on Debian 11)

 

[caramb]

Hi Rad_00,

Whenever you want to stick with kernel 5.4, I'm currently "maintaining" a dirty backport of kernel 5.9 driver for RTL8125/8125B.
Please, check here : https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=168&t=40598

I'm providing ready-to-load modules for proxmox from 5.4.65-1-pve through 5.4.114-1-pve along with instructions.
These are for Odroid H2+ hardware which embeds 2 RTL8125B but it should works.
However, there is one noticeable change you must deal with : load the R8125 firmware (rtl_nic/rtl8125a-3.fw) instead of the R8125B one.
In post https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?p=308741#p308741, replace

wget https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/firmware/linux-firmware.git/plain/rtl_nic/rtl8125b-2.fw

with

wget https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/firmware/linux-firmware.git/plain/rtl_nic/rtl8125a-3.fw

If you don't know which HW revision of R8125 you have (A or B), just download both firmwares, it won't arm.
Hope it helps.

 

[Rad_00]

First of all, thanks for your replies. I have managed to install Proxmox without using any extra network interfaces.

Do you have any USB nic around?

No. I wanted to avoid using any extra devices. Fortunately, @caramb's instructions helped me.

Hi Rad_00,

Whenever you want to stick with kernel 5.4, I'm currently "maintaining" a dirty backport of kernel 5.9 driver for RTL8125/8125B.
Please, check here : https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=168&t=40598

Thank you very much for your work! I have successfully installed Proxmox and upgraded the kernel to 5.11. Here's what I did:

I ran the installer in the debug mode and pressed CTRL+D. Then, I followed your guide step-by-step. I copied the firmware for both R8125A and R8125B. When I ran "ip link list", I couldn't see the "enp3s0" interface. I tried running "ip link set enp3s0 up" but it returned some error. I pressed CTRL+D again which started the installer and to my surprise... my machine connected to the DHCP server.

 

[caramb]

Good job Rad_00 !
Frankly, you went the hard way (compared to temporarily using some crapy usb network adapter during the install process)
Happy my work helped... even if, to be honest, it is not completely clear to me how you managed to bootstrap the missing driver issue directly from the Proxmox installer... and how it auto-magicaly recovered from the errors .
By stating you followed my instructions, I guess, you retrived the modules matching the proxmox installer kernel version, copied the missing firmwares, unloaded the stock realtek modules then loaded the custom modules.
I did not mention it but the interface name may change depending on your hardware due to the fact that most linux distros use the udev "Predictable Network Interface Names" scheme which is, for onboard devices, based on the pcie slot number => enpXs0.