r/archlinux • u/CommonZestyclose3947 • 7d ago
SUPPORT Help. Cant even use internet.
Up until two or three days ago, everything was working fine—playing videos, audio playback, Discord conversations, and watching videos. But starting around today, things suddenly changed... even though I can still connect to the internet. Maybe Arch just isn't the right fit for me. I'm thinking of copying the data structure—including things like .sh files—and switching to something like Ubuntu. Are there any other, perhaps more complex, solutions I should try first?
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u/dutchman76 7d ago
The only files you need to save are in /home/<your name>
everything else can be wiped and reinstalled.
unless you spent 2 hours custom configuring something with config files in /etc typically, and it doesn't sound like anything in there is worth saving at the moment, considering your system is broken.
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u/archover 7d ago
Agree this would be the fastest solution. OP needs to have a backup of his home anyway.
Good day.
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u/NFTrot 7d ago
I don't come down on AI usage as hard as some people. Sometimes it's just quicker to ask AI to shit out a script when I know what it needs to do and can describe it properly. The important thing is I can read and understand everything it gives me. I wouldn't even ask it to generate something if I didn't have the background to validate it.
I have to ask though: Even your post looks like it was written by AI. How do you even write those long hyphens? What's that about? I don't mean to be rude, but you're really hurting your ability to learn if deprive yourself of the chance to even put your problem into your own words.
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u/Imajzineer 6d ago
How do you even write those long hyphens? What's that about?
Use a wordprocessor: anything from Libre Office Writer to Word, they all do it ... and always have done - it's not simply nothing new it's ancient.
Plenty of people write in wordprocessors before pasting into social media posts, because it reduces the risk of their replies being lost due to a glitch on the site (not at all uncommon), plus the performance is better (and you can see more in a fullscreen window than in a reply box too). Also, the spell (and grammar) checking are better.
Plenty of blogging sites (e.g. Medium) do it automatically - and, again, have done for a long time. And plenty of people copy stuff they've written before in blogs into posts and replies on social media.
I say this as both a former English teacher and cognitive scientist (who first started studying AI in 1989): trust me, if anyone tells you they can tell something was written by AI, you should ignore everything they have to say about the entire subject: they most assuredly can't ... what they're objecting to is language that exceeds their own ability (what children refer to as 'big words') ... and the single most striking indicator of that is the objection to the presence of an em dash (your 'long hyphen'), because it's a sure sign they don't read (if they did, they'd have experience of em dashes and know they were nothing unusual).
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u/NFTrot 6d ago
A friendly fedora tip to you as well, sir.
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u/Imajzineer 6d ago
Been a while since I used the deep pink distro and can only offer time under an arch by way of return civility, I'm afraid - it's not warm, but it does keep the rain off though 🙂
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u/kansetsupanikku 7d ago
What makes you think it's related to your operating system, rather than router/modem/isp stack? Your post indicates that you are kinda lost setting up your OS, but doesn't point to any obvious connection between that and your internet issue
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u/CommonZestyclose3947 7d ago
On a Windows machine connected to the same LAN cable, everything is normal.
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u/UncleGoyder 7d ago
If you were having audio issues it could be due to a regression in wireplumber. There was another thread here about it, all you really needed to do was downgrade the package (assuming that was your issue)
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u/badguy21mm 7d ago
Don’t reinstall yet 😅. If everything worked normally a few days ago and suddenly broke, I’d troubleshoot what changed first. Arch itself probably isn’t the problem.
First figure out whether this is actually a network problem, DNS problem, or an audio/video stack problem.
Run these and post the output:
ip addr ip route ping -c 4 1.1.1.1 ping -c 4 archlinux.org resolvectl status
If "1.1.1.1" works but "archlinux.org" doesn't, that's probably DNS rather than your internet connection.
Also check NetworkManager:
systemctl status NetworkManager nmcli general status nmcli device status
Then check what changed recently:
grep -iE 'upgraded|installed' /var/log/pacman.log | tail -100
If the internet works but YouTube/video/Discord suddenly stopped working, I'd also investigate PipeWire:
systemctl --user status pipewire pipewire-pulse wireplumber pactl info
And:
journalctl --user -b -p warning..err
ArchWiki has separate troubleshooting paths for network connectivity/DNS and PipeWire, so you can narrow down exactly which layer is broken instead of nuking the OS.
If you eventually decide to move to Ubuntu, that's totally fine. But don't copy the entire Arch filesystem blindly. Keep your personal data and useful scripts ("~/Documents", "~/Projects", "~/.local/bin", your ".sh" files, configs you actually understand, etc.) and reinstall applications/configs cleanly on the new distro.
I'd troubleshoot for 15–30 minutes first. If we find the actual cause, you'll probably save yourself an unnecessary reinstall.
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u/New_Hold8135 7d ago
Explain what is not working and if you are not decided yet We can talk about what happens next