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#1
Gigabit LAN Connection Speed Problem
Most times, after my PC has booted, the Local Area Connection Status dialogue box shows a connection speed of only 100Mbps instead of the 1Gbps that it is designed to run at.
My PC does occasionally connect at 1Gbps on a cold boot, usually after I’ve run a registry optimisation programme.
This shows me that it is actually capable of running at 1Gbps but, usually upon a reboot, it defaults to 1Mbps again.
It also, occasionally and spontaneously, changes its connection speed from 100Mbps to 1Gbps upon Resume from Sleep mode. (i.e. say after a cold boot it runs at 100Mbps (as per usual), if I then put it into Sleep Mode for a while and wake it up again, it sometimes resumes showing a connection speed of 1Gbps!
I have carried out all the checks/BIOS upgrades suggested by Gigabyte for my motherboard with no change. I have replaced the Ethernet cable with a new (CAT5E) cable that I know supports 1Gbps connection speeds.
I use a Netgear GS108 8-port Gigabit Switch on my LAN which shows me when my LAN connection is running at 1Gbps (green LED) and when it’s running at 100Mbps (orange LED). I observe that, during a cold boot the LED flashes green 5 or 6 times and then defaults to a steady orange colour (i.e. 100Mbps), by which time the Log In screen has appeared. It’s as if the system attempts to load the gigabit driver which fails and so it resorts to the 100Mbps driver?
I think this may be a driver issue but I don’t know how to tackle it.
My PC's network card driver details: Atheros AR8131 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (NDIS 6.20)
Any ideas will be gratefully received.
Thank you for reading all this through!
Tim.