Realtek 8111E issue, possibly affecting motherboard now?

spdragoo

Expert
Ambassador
Argh, this is getting ridiculous.

So, the other night I pulled my video card from my PC to test a friend's system (they were getting innumerable visual artifacts on their desktop with the original HD 4850 in their Dell Studio XPS), & determined they need a new video card. After replacing my card back in my PC, I couldn't connect to the Internet; it said I didn't have an Ethernet adapter. My mobo is the Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 (rev. 1.0), which has an onboard Realtek 8111E Gigabit adapter, & I'm running Windows 7 Professional 64-bit. I hadn't unplugged it or messed with the network settings, so it seemed really weird.

Running the troubleshooter gave me a result saying that it couldn't find the adapter, mentioned "Deep Sleep" mode & told me to plug the power cord back in -- which is completely screwy, since the only "power cord" used by the onboard adapter is the main power cord for the case itself. Rebooting didn't fix it, so I went into Device Manager & had it try searching for "new" hardware. That got it working again...until the next day (yesterday), when it disappeared again. This time, it wouldn't come back: Device Manager couldn't find it, rebooting didn't work, & even reinstalling drivers (both original & most recently downloaded) did squat.

I was able to pick up a PCI adapter from Micro Center for about $15. It works fine now... except that I'm now getting about 30-60 seconds on bootup *before* I get the usual BIOS post screen.

First, is this some sort of known issue, either with this particular adapter or just this particular mobo/manufacturer? Second, is this an isolated failure, or is it indicative of a possible failure of the entire mobo?
 

spdragoo

Expert
Ambassador
I had already used System Restore to take it back to a restore point prior to the problem, as well as uninstalling & reinstalling the drivers (both a recent updated one from Gigabyte's site & the original driver from my mobo disc), so I doubt reinstalling the OS will help.

Service would also be problematic -- you have to get an RMA code from Gigabyte, then ship them the motherboard -- and would leave me without the computer for probably weeks (definitely suboptimal).

At least the new PCI adapter (Trend Gigabit) is working, so I can go online at home (i.e. will probably check the Gigabyte forums & even their tech support site). But are there any utilities that can be used to check the mobo out (similar to a checkdisk-type app)?