Friday, January 20th 2023
PSA: Intel I226-V 2.5GbE on Raptor Lake Motherboards Has a Connection Drop Issue: No Fix Available
The Intel Ethernet i226-V onboard 2.5 GbE controller appears to have a design flaw that causes the Ethernet connection to drop at random times for a few seconds. The I226-V is the latest version of Intel's cost-effective 2.5 Gbps Ethernet networking chips meant for PC motherboards with chipsets that have integrated MACs (i.e. Intel chipsets). It succeeds the I225-V, which was Intel's first consumer 2.5 GbE PHY. The I225-V was plagued by various issues that caused it to be unstable at 2.5 Gbps (but could be worked around by forcing 1 GbE mode). Many premium Intel 700-series chipset Socket LGA1700 motherboards integrate the new I226-V, which is the I225's successor, as their default onboard 2.5 GbE controller. Some enthusiast-segment motherboards have a second Ethernet controller that's either of a different brand (such as Realtek or Marvell), or a different kind of wired Ethernet (such as 10 GbE).
Since mid-December, users of Intel 700-series chipset motherboards (which debut the I226-V), have been reporting random connections drops to Intel's Support Community, Microsoft, ASUS and Reddit 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. These drops are momentary, last a few seconds, and you'll mostly not notice it; however for applications that need an uninterrupted connection (such as online gaming, video conferencing, VPN, Remote Desktop etc.), such a link drop will be noticeable. You can check if you are affected by opening Windows Event Viewer, navigate to "Windows Logs," "System" and search for "e2fnexpress," in particular Event 27 "Intel Ethernet Controller I226-V, Network link is disconnected." and Event 32 "Intel Ethernet Controller I226-V. Network link has been established at 1 Gbps full duplex." We've experienced the issue in our labs. We tried updating to the latest 27.8 drivers from Intel, and used the latest motherboard BIOS, at 1 Gbps speed, but the issue couldn't be fixed reliably. In the end, we just switched over to the motherboard's second network interface, which is not an Intel NIC, and the issue went away. Another option could be to buy a cheap PCI-Express network card or use the board's integrated Wi-Fi. Still, such issues aren't acceptable, especially not from a world-leading manufacturer like Intel, who once was reputed for the quality of its networking equipment. Intel and its motherboard partners need to get on top of this issue.
Update Mar 1st: Intel has issued a Windows workaround and patch for these issues. Let us know if this fixes it for you.
Update Mar 4th: User @lovingbenji reports that on his system this new driver version does not fix the disconnect issue.
Since mid-December, users of Intel 700-series chipset motherboards (which debut the I226-V), have been reporting random connections drops to Intel's Support Community, Microsoft, ASUS and Reddit 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. These drops are momentary, last a few seconds, and you'll mostly not notice it; however for applications that need an uninterrupted connection (such as online gaming, video conferencing, VPN, Remote Desktop etc.), such a link drop will be noticeable. You can check if you are affected by opening Windows Event Viewer, navigate to "Windows Logs," "System" and search for "e2fnexpress," in particular Event 27 "Intel Ethernet Controller I226-V, Network link is disconnected." and Event 32 "Intel Ethernet Controller I226-V. Network link has been established at 1 Gbps full duplex." We've experienced the issue in our labs. We tried updating to the latest 27.8 drivers from Intel, and used the latest motherboard BIOS, at 1 Gbps speed, but the issue couldn't be fixed reliably. In the end, we just switched over to the motherboard's second network interface, which is not an Intel NIC, and the issue went away. Another option could be to buy a cheap PCI-Express network card or use the board's integrated Wi-Fi. Still, such issues aren't acceptable, especially not from a world-leading manufacturer like Intel, who once was reputed for the quality of its networking equipment. Intel and its motherboard partners need to get on top of this issue.
Update Mar 4th: User @lovingbenji reports that on his system this new driver version does not fix the disconnect issue.
207 Comments on PSA: Intel I226-V 2.5GbE on Raptor Lake Motherboards Has a Connection Drop Issue: No Fix Available
Good going Intel, you're really making yourselves look good in the eyes of the consumer. NOT!!!
Edit : My UNIFI Dream Machine is the main router and the modem (directly connected to the fiber module through a Cat6 UNIFI Network cable)
The network cable in the walls is a Cat5E F/UTP and therefore the computer's speed is set at 1Gb/s.
For anyone still having problems: go physical first and swap cables/directly connect as that eliminates the easiest thing when troubleshooting.
Edit : And concerning the disconnections issues that may happen with the Dream Machine they are totally different and are logged into the DM system log, here for those issues the DM logs nothing, it is not the same type of issues
I would just say buy a pci-e card and save the hassle, but 2.5gbit cards are still not particuly consumer price friendly and modern boards have practically no pci-e slots these days.
ATM since the 2 last days, I have only one e2fnexpress network disconnect when I start up the computer but after it seems it has stopped occuring. It's only 1 day and a half period of testing so I'll let you know after a few days if this actually fixed the issue for me.
In my ITX I have a i225v (rev2 chip) and forcing 1Gbps full duplex solved connection problems for me even with EEE turned on but I also have unchecked allow device to save power.
Now even at restart I don't have the issue anymore. We'll keep you updated in the following days.
Thanks a lot A computer Guy
-
Following the information found here: www.pugetsystems.com/labs/support-hardware/Intel-i225-V-and-Z490-Chipset---Network-Connection-Issues-1981/
"According to Intel the only way to completely eliminate the issue is with a hardware fix on their end. They did resolve the issue in Q3 2020 but any devices manufactured before then will use i225-V instead of the new and improved i225-V2. We have identified a workaround that is detailed below."
TLDR: manually uninstall your network drivers and setup driver version : 1.0.2.8 (straight from the .inf) that fixes it:
-
Globally:
1- Check your network drivers version from the Device manager.
2- downloadmirror.intel.com/30301/eng/prowinx64_26_0.zip << You want that one ! (get also the last version of the Drivers just in case, in the process you'll loose connectivity).
(note that the path might be dead if you read this in several months, from Intel website you can get the current one looking for those:
3- Then from your "Device manager" your right click on the Ethernet Device and you uninstall it.
(right click on the intel ethernet connection and uninstall there - yours will be different - I am not running the same eth card in that screenshot)
4- You reboot. (you'll loose internet connexion - not stress. It's expected).
5- We'll install the driver from the .inf themselves.
You can either extract PROWinx64.exe and get to the .inf. If you don't know how to do that, you launch the ProWinx64.exe and click next. Then you go in your Temp files and search for this kind of folder:
C:\Users\<your username here>\AppData\Local\Temp\WZSE0.TMP (you can reach the temp using win+R and writing %temp% there then enter)
--
Then you open the PRO2500 folder:
then winx64 then NDIS68
Then right click on e2f68.inf
This should manually install the network driver.
Reboot.
6- Hopefully you drivers are now in version 1.0.2.8 (and not the one you saw at step 1) and your problem is fixed.
Still, Foxville is a hopeless chipset. This thing is garbage and Intel should be deeply ashamed of it, and i'll reiterate that them doubling down on this trash NIC by releasing a fourth revision of it under a different model number only shows how absolutely shameless they are. After the second stepping containing the bugs it did, they should have just cancelled the entire project and developed another from scratch.