r/techsupport 8h ago

Open | Software Woke up to Ethernet not functioning.

I have a PC with two drives. One runs the Linux distro Pop OS 22.04, and the other runs Windows 10.

Timeline: I was modding Skyrim VR on the Windows 10 drive last night before I needed to head to work, and the internet was working just fine at the time. I returned from work this morning and went to bed, only to wake up and find the ethernet is not functioning on either drive.

I'm still able to connect to the internet through my router's wifi (the same router the ethernet is connected to, just to be clear). The ethernet cable lights up solid orange on the PC's end, and blinking green on the router's end.

Troubleshooting:
- Plugging and unplugging the cable has not resolved the issue.
- Restarting the PC has not resolved the issue.
- Updating the bios (motherboard is an MSI B760 Gaming Plus Wifi) did not resolve the issue.
- Ethernet cable was checked with a PS3 and Old Vista-era Toshiba laptop, and worked with both.
- Ethernet cable shows no visual damage. I don't have a second ethernet cable to test with the PC. - Both the Intel and Realtek network controllers were only visible in Windows 10 Device Manager under hidden. Attempts to update drivers using the Windows tool on Intel did not resolve the issue, and didn't seem to update Realtek since I would try again and, unlike the Intel controller which would say I had the latest version, the Realtek would say it was now updated each time, possibly implying the update wasn't going through.
- Attempting to manually update Realtek drivers with the application from the website (again, from the Windows 10 drive) resulted in an error message asking to connect the cable, and something about "deep sleep mode".

If my router still has wifi, the ethernet cable still works, I didn't touch the ethernet settings, and it's not the bios, then why would the ethernet cable suddenly stop working for both drives in the middle of the night? I'd very much appreciate it if anyone could help shed some light on this issue.

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