Tech Goes Boom

Belkin F5D5005 on Ubuntu

The Belkin F5D5005 Gigabit Ethernet PCI card claims to work with Linux kernels 2.4 and 2.6--at least that's what it says on the retail box. However, when you go to Belkin's site to download the latest Linux drivers, they are nowhere to be found.

Turns out that the mellifluous F5D5005 works with the SysKonnect SK-98xx drivers, which support a stupefying gaggle of operating systems.

SysKonnect publishes a Linux installation guide for the SK-98xx cards, which is depressingly involved. However, it looks like Ubuntu comes with the drivers pre-installed, and the only thing you have to do is issue the command modprobe sk98lin with appropriate privileges, and the driver loads. Fantastic. This may also work with other distributions that ship 2.6 kernels.

In order to get the driver--or kernel module, to be more precise--to load at startup, edit the file /etc/modules by adding the line sk98lin, and all will be well. Editing this file should work on all Debian-based distributions.

Ah, much less of an ordeal than I feared...