Alternative to onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

[emaf]

Hello all.

Note to anyone here using his hackintosh in a network.

Onboard ethernet (realtek) works poorly, it does not matter wich driver is in use (lnx2mac is the best one imho). I appreciate all the work lnx2mac took to get a decent driver for osx, but on high loads, onboard lan is not doing good.

I did not noticed how bad it was working until last week when i had to work on a project where several 7gb videos over the network were involved.

Network freezing, delaying on connect to the server, bad bad bad...

So i digged on Amazon a little and found this:

Presto Gigabit Ethernet Pro PCIe Card http://www.amazon.es/dp/B0017K6BR8/
USA:http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0017K6BR8/

this card is 42€ and works OOB (no need for any kext), and is amazingly stable and fast (twice as much, i can get now stable readings to the nas of about 85mb/s)

I'll keep this thread updated with more testing, but right now, is working 300% better than onboard lan did.

 

[Shakin_Handz]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

There's a huge thread already discussing this fact by PowerPC. Also their is a Rosewill card that uses the same chipset at a fraction of the cost.

 

[emaf]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

There's a huge thread already discussing this fact by PowerPC. Also their is a Rosewill card that uses the same chipset at a fraction of the cost.

did not found any specific post regardint this card, sorry if this is posted already.

Rosewil is not available here in europe as long as i know.


P.D.
OSx feels much more "agile" now.

 

[emaf]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

After a few days working with the sonnet card, i can absolutely advice you all to get one. It's working much much better than the realtek one.

Transfers are stable wether the load is high or low. Browsing the network is like 10 times faster (now it's done instantly).

 

[legionnaire_live]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

Does this rosewill one need any kexts?? or does it just work?

 

[MacMan]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

The onboard Realtek works great, I've never had an issue with the lnx2mac drivers on any of my builds.

 

[emaf]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

The onboard Realtek works great, I've never had an issue with the lnx2mac drivers on any of my builds.

It works nice under light use, or when not having to use a server / lan storage. My transfers never went over of 40-45mbps or so, and connecting the shares on the servers always freezed for like 2-3 seconds. (no big deal, but when you do it a lot....)

I dont want by any mean devalue the work of lnx2mac, he'd made a hell of a work providing us with such a nice driver. I don't think is a problem with the driver, i think the onboard realtek lan is very bad quality chip.

Sonnet card works OOB, and works 100% nice. Being 30€, i just say its a very well worth buy for anyone in need of lan storage access.

If you just need to browse internet, onboard card will be good enough.

 

[MacMan]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

I use it on a server on a Gigabit ethernet network doing heavy file transfers with no issues.

 

[emaf]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

I use it on a server on a Gigabit ethernet network doing heavy file transfers with no issues.

interesting, maybe we can benchmark a little. wich specific chip are you using?

 

[AP2]

Re: stop using onboard lan now! Sonnet GE1000LA

i too am using this card. i made the switch when VPN connection would not connect or microsoft remote desktop client would not work. installed the sonnet card and that fixed all my issues. also, apple USB ehternet adapter works oob as well and VPN/MS remote desktop works too. only downside is its 10/100 only.