Confused about using ethtool in VM running SLES 10

[tshilson]

Hi All,

Part of our standard SLES setup is to use ethtool to set the networking parameters thusly: ethtool -s speed 100 duplex full autoneg off

I get the following response: cannot get current device settings: Operation not supported

not setting speed

not setting duplex

not setting autoneg

What gives? A quick look on the VMware forums and the doc doesn't tell me anything useful.

The setting for the vm show that the network adaptor is "Flexible" but the kernel has vmxnet loaded.

Thanks for any help you can share,

Tom

[admin]

Why do you want to force the NIC to 100 Full?

This does not seem to be a valid step in your install anymore.

The VM to vSwitch connection is at 1G Full.

BTW - I deleted that duplicate post for you.

[tshilson]

>Why do you want to force the NIC to 100 Full?

In one sense it doesn't matter. I am interested in the functionality of ethtool under VMware ESX. Should I just accecpt that the ethtool as shipped doesn't understand the vmxnet driver and is worthless?

Do any of the display functions? Is there any documentation?

Thanks. And thanks for deleting the dup record.

Tom

[kharbin]

You are trying to treat a virtual server like a physical one.

Speed, duplex and autoneg are set at the host level, not within the VM. Thats the beauty of virtualization, you don't have to set every VM individual.

This is all covered in detail in the admin manual.

my 2 cents

[tshilson]

Thank you. I shall dive into the manual on Monday.

Thanks again

tom

[admin · Accepted solution]

You are welcome.

Yes, I would consider ethtool worthless in a VM.