Christopher Murphy

Q: Built-in ethernet vanished

I've been using built-in ethernet since forever, including the last 2-3 weeks clean installed El Capitan without problems. Today, inexplicably while working all of a sudden I'm not connected to the Internet. Network panel says the cable isn't connected, and the usual troubleshooting ensues. I've deleted all connections in Network panel, and network items from /Library/Preferences and rebooted multiple times and now in Network there isn't even an ethernet interface. System Information > Network only shows: Bluetooth PAN, FireWire, Thunderbolt Bridge, and Wi-Fi. No ethernet.

 

OK so I boot a live image of Fedora Linux, it sees and uses the ethernet connection just fine. So the hardware is clearly OK, it looks like the OS has somehow face planted.

MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2011), OS X El Capitan (10.11.3)

Posted on Feb 26, 2016 6:29 PM

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Q: Built-in ethernet vanished

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  • by liberacion2009,

    liberacion2009 liberacion2009 Feb 27, 2016 9:18 AM in response to Christopher Murphy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 9:18 AM in response to Christopher Murphy

    First of all, I am terribly disappointed about Apple that things like this happen. It's simply not acceptable! Today suddenly *PLOFF* my ethernet connection on my almost new iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, Late 2015) was gone. Checked system preferences > network, nope. No more entry re ethernet. Checked ABOUT THIS MAC and guess what: my Mac has no ethernet card… Ooops! – Did delete the relevant files in /Library/preferences/SystemConfiguration rebooted, negative. No more ethernet. Reset NVRAM but again to no avail.

     

    While calling Apple Support I booted my iMac in recovery mode and kicked off the OSX El Capitan reinstall. That took 45 mins on my iMac. Exactly the time it took for the Apple Support guy to come to the conclusion that he couldn't help and would have to put me through to his boss to go deeper under the hood. The guy I talked to sent me the link to this thread.

     

    I read it through in parallel on my MacBook and told the Apple guy that I didn't understand how to do this. Maybe this is solution for the super-pros. I would consider myself advanced to pro. I didn't get it and neither could the Apple guy explain how to do what Chris suggests.

     

    But you know what? In the end reinstalling the OS did the job. Ethernet is back and back connected. Basically, I successfully helped myself while waiting for Apple support to come up with a solution, 47 minutes in total.

     

    Which brings me back to the beginning of this post: Utterly disappointing! What would my wife do in such a situation with her iMac? What would my 80 year old mother do with her MacBook Air? – Yes, dispair and ultimately turn to me…

     

    Really hope you guys at the Apple engineering department come up with a proper fix for this untenable situation asap.

  • by Matt Kulka,

    Matt Kulka Matt Kulka Feb 27, 2016 9:27 AM in response to bpran
    Level 1 (110 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 9:27 AM in response to bpran

    Edit:

    oops, someone tried it and still no success

    http://forums.macrumors.com/threads/software-update-031-51913-will-break-your-et hernet-driver.1958521/#post-22615556

    error message : "This computer does not appear to have any PCI Ethernet cards installed"

     

    The kext cache may still need purged afterwards?


    In recovery mode Terminal: kextcache -invalidate "/Volumes/<your boot volume>"

    In normal mode Terminal: sudo kextcache invalidate /

  • by Daniel P. B. Smith,

    Daniel P. B. Smith Daniel P. B. Smith Feb 27, 2016 9:31 AM in response to Christopher Murphy
    Level 2 (275 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 9:31 AM in response to Christopher Murphy

    It's definitely the same problem. The AppleKextExcludeList.kext version 3.27, dated Nov. 2015, is on my Super Duper backup from just a few weeks ago--AFTER I upgraded to El Capitan. And the problem showed up this morning, and the version in my active system folder is 3.28.1 and dated February 24th, 2016.

     

    I had no idea that Apple was pushing out updates without my knowledge (or permission).

     

    At the moment, it is just a nuisance--I just use it to connect to the Internet, and I enabled WiFi and can live with that.

     

    Can those familiar with Apple's update mechanism tell me: is there a reasonable chance that if I just wait a few days, Apple will fix the error without my needing to do anything? I can follow Matt's directions, but, honestly, typing keyboard commands to copy .kext files into places where Apple doesn't want end-users to copy them is daunting.

  • by bpran,

    bpran bpran Feb 27, 2016 9:33 AM in response to Daniel P. B. Smith
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 9:33 AM in response to Daniel P. B. Smith

    Totally agree with Daniel

  • by To_Mi,

    To_Mi To_Mi Feb 27, 2016 12:46 PM in response to Daniel P. B. Smith
    Level 2 (351 points)
    iLife
    Feb 27, 2016 12:46 PM in response to Daniel P. B. Smith

    Hi Daniel,

    I had no idea that Apple was pushing out updates without my knowledge (or permission).

     

    The setting exists in System Preferences.

    This type of updates can be disabled by unchecking 'Install system data files and security updates' at 'App Store' pane.

    el-capitan-app-store.png

  • by William Kruidenier,

    William Kruidenier William Kruidenier Feb 27, 2016 2:44 PM in response to Matt Kulka
    Level 1 (49 points)
    Desktops
    Feb 27, 2016 2:44 PM in response to Matt Kulka

    I tried this and it did not restore my ethernet connection.

  • by akastro27,

    akastro27 akastro27 Feb 27, 2016 2:51 PM in response to Christopher Murphy
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 2:51 PM in response to Christopher Murphy

    Hi folks this solves the problem for me!

     

    http://forums.macrumors.com/threads/software-update-031-51913-will-break-your-et hernet-driver.1958521/page-2#post-22615953

     

    It's the same link share it before in some post here, but in the Thread the user Fropmeister post this solution

    It works for me!  Hope this help!

  • by plth,

    plth plth Feb 27, 2016 3:38 PM in response to akastro27
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 3:38 PM in response to akastro27

    I talked to Apple  support today and in short here is what is happening:

    I apologize that your iMac was affected by this issue. Our engineers are currently working on a software update now that will resolve this


    I have wifi, so I will wait for the fix.....  I hope soon....

  • by William Kruidenier,

    William Kruidenier William Kruidenier Feb 27, 2016 3:51 PM in response to Matt Kulka
    Level 1 (49 points)
    Desktops
    Feb 27, 2016 3:51 PM in response to Matt Kulka

    Tried it, but it doesn't overwrite the bad extension.

  • by johnbirt,

    johnbirt johnbirt Feb 27, 2016 4:12 PM in response to Christopher Murphy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 4:12 PM in response to Christopher Murphy

    I suddenly noticed after a period of not using iMac since 10.11.3 that ethernet was not working and networking claimed cable was unplugged. Tried many of the fixes to no avail. One was to remove cable and remove ethernet from networking and hope it would auto detect after a reboot. No and ethernet was then not an option to add.

     

    Contacted support and all the suggestions didn't work so it was suggested that I did a re-install of OS X. Not an experienced iMac user as mainly worked on Windows platform. Incidentally I have Parallels installed and that worked happily with the ethernet card OS X claimed wasn't there so not a hardware problem.

    Further problem was my router I think is dying and needs replacement and in particular suffers from wireless drop out or possibly its TalkTalk - very likely actually.

     

    After one aborted attempt at re-installation via CMD - R where the wireless dropped out it managed to hold together long enough having left it for probably 5/6 hours only to come back and find all had gone well and 10.11.3 had been installed and apparently everything seemed pretty much as before. It looked like disappointment as ethernet was nowhere to be seen in the networking setup. However this time it was actually present as an option to add which I did. Still no sign of a working ethernet until I used the Advanced option and forced a DHCP renewal.

    All now seems well so if all else fails a re-install seems to put things back they way they are supposed to be. 

     

    Hope this gives some encouragement to those not adept at hacking!

     

    John B

  • by voxkenny,

    voxkenny voxkenny Feb 27, 2016 4:41 PM in response to Christopher Murphy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 4:41 PM in response to Christopher Murphy

    I have a 2010 27" iMac and a 2016 MacPro, both running 10.11.3. The iMac hasn't been a problem but I lost both the ethernet connections on the MacPro, with 2 reds on the prefs panel. I fixed it by connecting the MacPro as a Firewire disk to the iMac, and copying the AppleKextExcludeList from the iMac. When I rebooted the MacPro both ethernet connections were fine. The WiFi did not give any problems at all.

  • by gervaisc911,

    gervaisc911 gervaisc911 Feb 27, 2016 4:35 PM in response to Matt Kulka
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 4:35 PM in response to Matt Kulka

    Worked on my side. Many thanks!

  • by platad,

    platad platad Feb 27, 2016 4:43 PM in response to Christopher Murphy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 4:43 PM in response to Christopher Murphy

    Hi,

    apparently Apple pushed

     

    Incompatible Kernel Extension Configuration Data:

      Version:    3.28.2

      Source:    Apple

      Install Date:    2/27/16, 21:28

     

    This solves the problem with the Ethernet port.

    Thank you all for the info posted. Very useful indeed.

     

    dp

  • by Daniel P. B. Smith,

    Daniel P. B. Smith Daniel P. B. Smith Feb 27, 2016 6:06 PM in response to platad
    Level 2 (275 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 6:06 PM in response to platad

    Any idea how we would go about "pulling" this? I'm afraid I couldn't stand it any longer, because...

     

    ...a side effect of no Ethernet is that (!!!!!) I couldn't launch any applications I'd bought from the App Store. Apparently it phones home to check the license and apparently the license is keyed to some piece of information it can't get if the Ethernet driver isn't running.

     

    Basically I took a deep breath and downloaded and ran the installer package Matt mentioned above, and that fixed the problem, but now I have the November 2015 AppleKextExcludeList.kext file and don't know how I can get the updated file.

  • by bpran,

    bpran bpran Feb 27, 2016 6:24 PM in response to Daniel P. B. Smith
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Feb 27, 2016 6:24 PM in response to Daniel P. B. Smith

    Apple has now released a version 3.28.2 that will install over the bad extension.

    The link to the update:

    http://swcdn.apple.com/content/down...n0573nt31ifb45/AppleKextExcludeList_10_11. pkg

     

    just install and reboot your computer.

     

    hope this will help.

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