Anyone with experience w/ Intel i225/i226 network issues?

[Merek]

I just purchased an MSI z790i board what has the Intel i226-v onboard nic and I'm already having issues with it disconnecting. I know they've had these problems over the last few years and I was hoping they were resolved by now but evidently not. I've done some extensive research and tried the fixes I've found such as disabling energy efficient ethernet, power savings, auto-negotiation to another speed... nothing works and the only "fix" is to reboot the machine only for it to show itself again sometime later. MSI literally just released a Win11 driver dated today but the Win10 version is from March 2023. I've tried the Intel version but gives me a code 39 and doesn't work. I'm currently using a Trendnet 2.5gbe USB C adapter to get me by, it does have WiFi but I much prefer the wired connection. It was between this and the Gigabyte, the cost was about the same but the MSI did have the memory I already had in stock listed as being compatible which is why I chose them. I've already updated the BIOS and all the drivers.

I have 2x Gigabyte boards with the i225-v and they've been working great with no issues with the nic. Evidently the issues that plague these adapters are not make/model specific and only tied to the i225-v/i226-v.

 

[Pew]

No 225/226 issues here so far with my own or work/client PCs. You still have the issue even when removing all the drivers and just running the drivers that MS automatically loads?

 

[Merek]

No 225/226 issues here so far with my own or work/client PCs. You still have the issue even when removing all the drivers and just running the drivers that MS automatically loads?

I downloaded all the latest drivers from their website. These are not natively built in with Win10 so you have to install them separately. I purchased it 3/24/2024 and it's been working great until the last few days it started dropping the connection.

 

[Pew]

Ugh at that point I'd just end up reformatting. I strongly dislike dealing with code 39 with network drivers.

 

[Merek]

Ugh at that point I'd just end up reformatting. I strongly dislike dealing with code 39 with network drivers.

I can reinstall, I've literally just installed Windows on this thing from scratch but really haven't put that much on it as of yet.

 

[wwillson]

I just purchased an MSI z790i board what has the Intel i226-v onboard nic and I'm already having issues with it disconnecting.

Is your cable at least Cat 5e and is the cable in good shape? Cat 5e supports 2.5Gb/s, but barely. Cat 6 supports twice the bandwidth, so you may want to upgrade if using a Cat 5e cable.

 

[Merek]

Is your cable at least Cat 5e and is the cable in good shape? Cat 5e supports 2.5Gb/s, but barely. Cat 6 supports twice the bandwidth, so you may want to upgrade if using a Cat 5e cable.

I'm using Cat8, the Trendnet USB has been working fine all evening but I just got done installing Windows 10 and it's still connected at the moment. I have a secondary drive installed that I copied everything over. Before I goto bed I'll swap cable back over to the onboard and check it again in the morning to see if it drops the connection overnight.

I have it connected to a Trendnet TEG-S750 that has 1/2.5/10 speeds. I was running 10gb to the desktop but with this new PC it's not really needed and 2.5gbe is fine. It's an ITX and it literally has one pci-e slot that's for the GPU.

 

[wwillson]

I'm using Cat8

Have you tried a different cable, even a Cat 6 or 7?

 

[Merek]

Have you tried a different cable, even a Cat 6 or 7?

I have not tried any other cables, I have a cat6 25ft that will reach for a test. I have 2 cable testers but if anyone is familiar with these Intel onboard ethernet adapters they do not have a good track record. I also posted on the MSI forums but noone has even responded as of yet. With my current situation my time is very limited to being able to work on my own stuff and a coworker left us back in Jan. so it's literally just me and my dad working at the shop but also we're making hay this week which is around 60 acres and only a few days to get it done, luckily we do have extra help for that. It's nice doing it once per year but it you're always crunched to get it all done in a few days. He rents out his land and they've planted rye for this year and getting ready to put corn in, they worked out a deal in the lease where he gets the rye to make hay for his cows, they actually mowed it and tedded it already once for us but it was way too wet when they mowed it and I've been tedding it all weekend and started raking today but hopeully will finish that tomorrow.

Not that anyone has been applying for a job but he is not hiring anyone right now, by the time you get them trained and up to speed to where you can turn them loose they always end up leaving.

 

[Pew]

If it disconnects again, what does the network icon show in the system tray.

 

[mk378]

Those chips use firmware which runs on a CPU core inside the NIC chip. The firmware boots into the NIC from a small flash chip dedicated to this purpose. The early versions of the firmware were buggy.

Replacing the Windows driver does not upgrade the firmware in the flash chip. There is a separate process for that.

 

[Merek]

If it disconnects again, what does the network icon show in the system tray.

It shows the circle icon that sortof looks like a planet. It's been fine overnight since reinstalling Windows again. I finally did get a response from someone on the MSI forums which basically said to upgrade to Windows 11.

 

[mk378]

That icon is a globe with an X in the corner meaning "No Internet." It replaces the one that looks like a flatscreen monitor which somehow means "Internet connected"

Check the motherboard maker's support site to see if there is a chip firmware upgrade. Intel does not publish the upgrades directly.

 

[Merek]

That icon is a globe with an X in the corner meaning "No Internet." It replaces the one that looks like a flatscreen monitor which somehow means "Internet connected"

Check the motherboard maker's support site to see if there is a chip firmware upgrade. Intel does not publish the upgrades directly.

I was able to find another firmware that had not been updated, it was listed with the bios but only as a hyperlink so I didn't pay any attention to it. I think some manufacturers include it with the bios so it does it all together but then others you have to update each component separately. I guess it could've been a compatibility issue since I had updated the bios it didn't update that, the version was listed along with the earlier bios version that it came with.

 

[wwillson]

I was able to find another firmware that had not been updated, it was listed with the bios but only as a hyperlink so I didn't pay any attention to it. I think some manufacturers include it with the bios so it does it all together but then others you have to update each component separately. I guess it could've been a compatibility issue since I had updated the bios it didn't update that, the version was listed along with the earlier bios version that it came with.

Did it help?

 

[Merek]

Did it help?

So far it's been rock solid at least as much from what it was before I started having this issue. I didn't really like the other answer of upgrading to 11, I know 10 is basically dead and on it's last legs but that's opening another can of worms. I went ahead and created an image of this system before I reinstalled the OS just so I had something to fall back in case something happened. His thoughts are more on the 12th-14th gen Intel's with the E cores and how 11 would be able to manage the cores a lot better.... granted I will most likely upgrade at some point to an i5/i7/i9 but right now I'm using an i3-14100 which is just a standard quad core w/ HT and more or less comparable to the Xeon it replaced. It's definitely faster and feels a bit more refined or polished in comparison.

Other than the 1150 system with the Xeon I really haven't used Intel since 775 and I typically go back and forth, use one for awhile and then switch. I should've upgraded it years ago but it finally got to the point where upgrading wasn't really feasible anymore I have other systems for some stuff that I'm running but this is the one that I use daily.

 

[Merek]

It's back again, disconnected sometime last night. At first I thought it was Nord but I ended up getting Surf Shark but it still lost connection using the new VPN. I've been slowly adding things back which is why it took awhile for it to come back. When I installed this one I uninstalled Nord. I found something on the Intel forums and I disabled a few more things they suggested in the advanced settings of the adapter.

 

[Merek]

I created another image of it this morning and went to the dark side.... I don't really have a whole lot of experience with it but so far it's horrendous. I know there are websites that get into tweaking the settings to get the look and feel back. So far it's been connected since this morning without issues. I tried to install the latest driver from MSI but it won't load the driver due to supposedly it's already using the best driver. I haven't removed the driver but it's dated from 2023.

 

[Pew]

Can you ping your router via the command prompt when you lose connection?

 

[Merek]

Can you ping your router via the command prompt when you lose connection?

It was same as before, the globe icon showing there's no internet, I was able to close out the VPN and then disable and re-enable my network adapter. It's just odd that when using Nord and Surf Shark that it breaks my connection, not at the same time as I've uninstalled Nord for now. So far I've been tweaking this thing, finally figured out how to fix the right click menu options and a theme that I can live with. I need the taskbar to be dark, I use Core Temp and couldn't read the number, I could've changed those colors around but was easier to just make the taskbar dark.

If it loses connection again I'll try that but according to the status it shows everything as working. I have it configured with a static address.