HP Probook 430 G8 System MAC not passing through USB Type-C Dongle
-
@sebastian-roth I’m not ready to blame the FOS Linux kernel just yet. If you look at the truth table (in my head) its indeterminate right now. On the left side you have FOS Linux and Windows acting the same by only showing the dongle mac address. On the right side you have the bios that is saying pass the 6C mac address through and iPXE seeing the 6C mac address for the dongle. If we can move Windows to the right side then I would say its something in the linux kernel (which it might still be).
Thinking back a bit, we did have an issue with the realtek… 8125 I think, where the driver in the kernel version was at 1.1 and on the realtek web site they had something like 1.7 or 1.8 for that same nic. With the linux kernel verison the nic would not talk on the network but with the updated driver from the realtek web site it worked just fine. It was something like they had the 8125, 8125A and 8125B version of the nic hardware which took the later driver to make them all work correctly. Its been a year or so, so I don’t remember the exact details. I do remember making a one-off kernel for that issue.
Edit: From one of the previous screen shots (all of them really helped us understand the situation) I see the hardware ID of that network adapter is [0bda:8153]. A quick google search found this page. I’m not sure I understand their logic for the kernel parameters, but it does list them. http://linux-hardware.org/?id=usb:0bda-8153
Edit2: Good-golly-bob that was hard to find the current driver. It looks like 2.15 is the latest external kernel driver. I have not looked in the linux source code yet to determine the current embedded driver version. Realtek official driver Then I came across this article. Realtek RTL8156 2.5G Chips + RTL8153 To Be Supported By Linux 5.13 Looking at a the realtek web site it looks like they have a 8153, 8153A, B, and now C versions. I wonder if what the OP has is one of the later versions of the chip that needs the updated driver. @Sebastian-Roth Didn’t I see you just built a test 5.15.x kernel? If so it may be interesting to try to see if it pulls in the pass through mac. That would push FOS Linux to the right side (<snark> who cares about windows anyway</snark>). Atually if you look at the listing for the windows driver it lists “Realtek USB GbE Family Controller” and not the specific model driver, but the generic one.
Edit3: The version of the realtek driver in 5.10.63 is still v1.11
Edit4: Looking at the linux firmware I see specific firmware for the 8153 nics
$ ls rtl815* rtl8153a-2.fw rtl8153a-4.fw rtl8153c-1.fw rtl8156b-2.fw rtl8153a-3.fw rtl8153b-2.fw rtl8156a-2.fw -
@sebastian-roth
Willing to try the latest 5.10.83 Kernel, but wondering how I do that.In CLI, I normally do the following to update to the latest Kernel:
cd /var/www/html/fog/service/ipxe
mv bzImage bzImage.orig
mv bzImage32 bzImage32.orig
wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage
wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage32
chown www-data:www-data bzImage*
file bzImage*Since you have given me a web address, how to I modify the syntax above to pull the latest Kernel from https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage-no-cdc_ether
I have really tried learning Linux, I have bought a book, watched videos and searched forums. Not everything is universal across the board for Linux. Please have patience as this is a very basic question but I’m afraid I don’t know how to update the Kernel.
Thank you,
Michael
-
@michaeloberg You can test that kernel for sure, but I think the answer is 5.13 and later. I see there is a 5.15.5 that was just created on https://fogproject.org/kernels/
Lets to with this route.
cd /var/www/html/fog/service/ipxe wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage-5.15.5 wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage-no-cdc_etherThat should bring them down to the FOG server without messing up anything else.
Now go into the web ui for that host that you manually registered with the 6C mac address. There is a kernel field. For Sebastians test enter
bzImage-no-cdc_etherin that field and schedule a debug capture or deploy doesn’t matter. Make sure you turn mac address pass through back on before you do that.Now pxe boot it, you should see bzImage-no-cdc_ether get transferred to the target computer. After a few screens of text you will be dropped at the fos linux command pompt. Key in
ip a sand look at the mac address for that adapter is it the dongle address or the pass through address?Now go back into the web ui and change the kernel parameter to
bzImage-5.15.5and save the settings. Now go to the target computer and key inrebootOnce again pxe boot into the debug mode (there is still an open deploy task so all you need to do is reboot the target computer and repxe boot it). When running under the 5.15 kernel see if the right mac address is passed withip a s -
Followed the steps you mentioned and when putting the kernel in for the host as bzImage-no-cdc_ether here are the screenshots of the boot and ip a s results:
Then I changed the parameter to bzImage-5.15.5 and here are the screenshots of the boot and ip a s results:
You can see in both cases the dongle address is display and not the System Address.
-
@michaeloberg Thank you for sticking with us on this. I guess the only trick I have left is to see if I can compile linux 5.15.5 with the updated driver from realtek to see if that resolves the issue. If that doesn’t then … I’m not sure. I will look at that tonight since I don’t have a lot of extra time during the day.
Make sure the firmware is updated on both the computer and network adapter please.
Lastly just to be sure that you are running the updated kernel. On the screen where you typed in the
ip a scommand if you typed inuname -ait should show you the kernel version. For the bzImage-5.15.5 file it should show 5.15.5 -
Sounds good and thank you. I have opened a ticket with HP as well, they escalated this to tier II engineering and am waiting for a call back.
I did update the BIOS on the computer from 1.06.03 to 1.06.04 and verified the NIC and Dongle have the latest firmware and even re-flashed the Dongle.
Here is the output from doing the command uname -a (keep in mind I still have bzImage-5.15.5 in the Host Kernel field in the GUI).
-
@michaeloberg OK I have a few kernels I want you to test. Please test each one to see if it reads the pass-thru mac address.
This first one is bzImage-rt-v215 This kernel has the version 2.15 driver from the realtek web site. The version built into the linux kernel is at version 1.11. This is kernel version 5.15.6
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qxcjC9ZrV8lVh4T6rgBtmtgSp7SWRzL9/view?usp=sharingThis next one is stock FOS linux kernel 5.15.6 but has the additional kernel options listed here: http://linux-hardware.org/?id=usb:0bda-8153 this kernel is called bzImage-rt-opts
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1t4WgWHOv3wIFjnodRtMsRcaO87XIZxM4/view?usp=sharingDon’t get discouraged if neither one of these works. We are trying to find out where the problem isn’t right now. I want you to run this command after you boot into debug mode and/if if fails
grep -i -e firmware /var/log/messagesWhat I’m looking for is if the rt8153 or something network related complains about missing firmware. As I mentioned before I did see several 8153 hardware specific firmware listed but we are not including them by default. The linux kernel will complain if it needs the firmware but none are built into the kernel. This is not a common error, but does happen now and again. Your case is unique so we are casting a wide net here.For the developers here are the setting changes I found when I compared the FOS Linux default config vs the web site.
# CONFIG_USB_IPHETH is not set CONFIG_USB_NET_CDCETHER=y CONFIG_USB_PEGASUS=y CONFIG_USB_RTL8150=y CONFIG_USB_USBNET=y CONFIG_USB_CATC=y CONFIG_USB_RTL8152=y # CONFIG_USB_GADGET is not set CONFIG_USB_PHY=y CONFIG_USB_SUPPORT=y CONFIG_USB_NET_DRIVERS=y # CONFIG_USB_RTL8153_ECM is not setThe not set ones are the deviations between the web site and the default FOS configurations. Personally I think the key is the last realtek settings but I set them all in the above kernel.
Here are the kernel option descriptions.
x Symbol: USB_IPHETH [=n] x x Type : tristate x x Defined at drivers/net/usb/Kconfig:580 x x Prompt: Apple iPhone USB Ethernet driver x x Depends on: NETDEVICES [=y] && USB_NET_DRIVERS [=y] x x Location: x x -> Device Drivers x x -> Network device support (NETDEVICES [=y]) x x -> USB Network Adapters (USB_NET_DRIVERS [=y]) x Symbol: USB_GADGET [=n] x x Type : tristate x x Defined at drivers/usb/gadget/Kconfig:17 x x Prompt: USB Gadget Support x x Depends on: USB_SUPPORT [=y] x x Location: x x -> Device Drivers x x -> USB support (USB_SUPPORT [=y]) x x Selects: USB_COMMON [=y] && NLS [=y] x x Selected by [n]: x x - USB_EHCI_TEGRA [=n] && USB_SUPPORT [=y] && USB [=y] && USB_EHCI_HCD [=yx x Symbol: USB_RTL8153_ECM [=n] x x Type : tristate x x Defined at drivers/net/usb/Kconfig:638 x x Prompt: RTL8153 ECM support x x Depends on: NETDEVICES [=y] && USB_NET_DRIVERS [=y] && USB_NET_CDCETHER [x x Location: x x -> Device Drivers x x -> Network device support (NETDEVICES [=y]) x x -> USB Network Adapters (USB_NET_DRIVERS [=y]) x x x -
Thanks for the update, one question I have is what/how do I apply the new kernel t once I download it? Before I was always downloading and applying them with this command:
cd /var/www/html/fog/service/ipxe
mv bzImage bzImage.orig
mv bzImage32 bzImage32.orig
wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage
wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage32
chown www-data:www-data bzImage
file bzImage**For the no-cdc_ther and 5.15 kernels, you had me type:
wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImag-5.15.5
wget https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage-no-cdc_etherAnd then change the kernel parameters in the GUI.
Thank you,
Michael
-
As this is for testing I’d suggest:
wget -O /var/www/fog/service/ipxe/bzImage-rt-v215 https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1qxcjC9ZrV8lVh4T6rgBtmtgSp7SWRzL9&export=download wget -O /var/www/fog/service/ipxe/bzImage-rt-opts https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1t4WgWHOv3wIFjnodRtMsRcaO87XIZxM4&export=downloadFrom the host in question, assuming it’s registered, go to edit it and in the Kernel field type in the name of the kernel file to test:
E.G.:
bzImage-rt-v215
bzImage-rt-opts -
@michaeloberg No problem. Since the files are coming from a google drive and not the “official” fog project web site you need to do things a bit differently.
First download them to your windows computer. They will go into the downloads folder.
Now they are in your downloads folder you have 2 options. You can go the gui route or command line by using putty’s
pscpprogram. The GUI route is probably the easiest, by installing winscp Use winscp to log into your FOG server. If you can login as root then do so. My guess it will only let you login as a normal user. Log into your fog server with winscp. If you can log into as root the navigate to/var/www/html/fog/service/ipxeand drop the files. If you have to log in as a normal user then just drop the files in your normal user home directory. Then open a command prompt and issue
sudo cp bzImage-rt-v215 /var/www/html/fog/service/ipxe
and
sudo cp bzImage-rt-opts /var/www/html/fog/service/ipxeEdit: Tom knows all of the tricks to get things done…
-
Hopefully I did this correctly. I used Tom’s commands and then changed the kernel parameters in the GUI and then at the debug prompt ran ip addr to get the MAC, it both instances it pulled the Dongle Address (3c:18:a0:cb:3f:b7).
Here is the confirmation of the kernel for rt-v215 followed by the ip addr and the grep -i -e firmware /var/log/message command:
Here is the confirmation of the kernel for rt-opts followed by the ip addr and the grep -i -e firmware /var/log/message command:
-
@michaeloberg Yep that was right. And we have another bread crumb to follow. We see for the ops kernel, it wants rtl8153a-4.fw
I CAN fix that. Give me a minute (well about 10).
-
@michaeloberg Try this as bzImage-rt-opts2
wget -O /var/www/fog/service/ipxe/bzImage-rt-opts2 https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1ovhBUdH5OHadajGepSuOxCjBCMh-rCos&export=downloadsame protocol as the last opts kernel. Again this might not solve the mac address issue but it looks different than the previous kernel with the same fog kernel settings but updated nic driver. We can rule out the older nic driver at fault here.
-
OK, downloaded rt-opts2 kernel and ran the same commands as before, here is the output and verification snapshot of the opts2 kernel:
-
@michaeloberg Well unfortunately we’ve hit a wall. But you have some additional things to now tell HP support.
We are using the latest linux kernel, with the appropriate settings for this nic driver. Yet we are still not seeing the pass thru mac address.
We attempted to use the latest realtek nic driver with the latest linux kernel and no success. (I’m really not liking this approach because its not keeping the linux kernel pure with well tested drivers, but we needed to do it to rule out an old linux kernel driver at fault).
The native windows driver is doing the same thing.
-
@george1421
I will let you know when I hear back from HP, have a good weekend.Mike
-
I opened a ticket with HP on Friday, they escalated it and still haven’t heard back. I will update the post as soon as I hear from them.
Michael
-
@sebastian-roth said in HP Probook 430 G8 System MAC not passing through USB Type-C Dongle:
@michaeloberg Ok, I just build a new kernel without the cdc_ether driver included (latest 5.10.83): https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage-no-cdc_ether
Give that a try and let us know.
I’m sorry, I don’t mean to threadjack, but I have been strugglebussing for years (literally) trying to get these Lenovo ThinkPad x1 Carbon Gens 7, 8 and 9 to image with a dongle but have had no luck. Using this kernal has solved the USB adapter problems. How do I go about making it the main kernal so I don’t have to pre-create a machine and specify the kernal?
Please feel free to break this off into another thread (I just wanted it to have some context,) as there are a few other things that I have questions about.
Thank you so much for the amazing things y’all do!
-
@george1421
Update - HP has a Mac Address Management software they had me install in the Windows environment that worked, however it doesn’t do anything for FOS or Deepin. The program is called hpmamsrv.exe.Here is the software: https://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp95501-96000/sp95997.exe
I have requested more information after relaying that this issue is not resolved as it doesn’t work for the Operating Systems.
I will let you know when I hear back from HP.
Michael
-
@michaeloberg Digging into the code a bit deeper I see that the stock linux kernel 8153 nic driver (v1.11) has support for mac pass through for lenovo. The realtek v2.15 driver (I added to one of the test kernels bzImage-rt-215) has additional support for Dell. Both Lenovo and Dell are specifically called out in the driver, but not HP. It looks like HP got around the windows driver issue by issuing a <snark>hack</snark> shim app that updates the mac address outside of the nic driver.
So if we think about it from a hacker’s perspective (1980’s terms not 2000’s terms for hacker) iPXE (which is reading the right value) is passing the mac address to bzImage as a kernel parameter (at least it should be). We might be able to use the “HP fix way” and use ethtool to replace the mac address of the detected nic. I know for a linux router project I worked on I was able to change the mac address of the nic to present itself as an Xbox mac. We would need to do this before the nic adapter is initialized in FOS linux (totally possible) so that means we might need a custom init.xz (also possible). Let me do some testing.
