Network outage with FC6 and sky2 driver

[Brian]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: fedora-list-bounces at redhat.com 
> [mailto:fedora-list-bounces at redhat.com] On Behalf Of Andreas Bernauer
> Sent: Friday, May 18, 2007 11:39 AM
> To: fedora-list at redhat.com
> Subject: Re: Network outage with FC6 and sky2 driver
> 
> Brian wrote on Fri, May 18 2007 at 11:11 (-0400):
> > I'm using rsync over ssh to backup a large amount of data(400Gb) to 
> > another
> > FC6 host located on the LAN. The target host is running the same 
> > kernel version but it's i386. I'm using a cheap Netgear Gigabit 
> > switch, model GS108. After 40-50Gb is transferred, the AMD-64-3200 
> > system's network completely drops and a reboot seems to be 
> the only way to restore.
> 
> Does it work when you transfer the file in smaller chunks?  
> If yes, then it looks like the hardware/driver problem you described.
> 
> Andreas.
> --
> http://www.lysium.de/blog
> 

I'm pretty sure this occurs with larger files. Unfortunately, I'm unable to
use the nvidia interface. 

I edited /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth* appropriately but for
some strange reason the nvidia interface is just not working (now, worked
two days ago). If I switch to the sky2 interface it works just fine so it's
not a network/cable problem. 

I'm starting to suspect a motherboard hardware failure. 

As far as I know (please correct me if I'm wrong) I'd only have to change
the ifcfg-eth* scripts to change the interface configuration. The specific
interface name (eth0, eth1 e.t.c) is determined by aliases in
/etc/modprobe.conf. Correct? 

I did this but the nVidia interface is not working. It comes up and shows
activity (Rx/Tx counters increase) but I cannot ping any host on my network.
Moving the cable / configuration back to the sky2 interface and everything
works (except, the sky2 driver problem)

Any ideas why the nVidia interface comes up but I cannot ping any hosts? 

Thanks,
-Brian