New Intel Pro 1000 card not working

[xtraspecialj]

Ok, I found a post from 2006 under Networking & Wireless, but it being so old I didn't trust that the solution would still apply today.

I recently purchased an Intel PWLA8391GT 1Gbit Pro 1000 card for my Ubuntu 8.10 machine. I have installed it and it shows up in lspci as Intel Corporation 8254PI Gigabit Ethernet Controller.

Under Ifconfig, it is listed as eth1 (I disabled my onboard nvidia lan in the bios, that was eth0) and shows all the correct advertised speeds, 10Mbs, 100Mbs, 1000Mbs. However, under speed and duplex it simply says Unknown! and at the bottom it says link detected: no. However, on the back of the card, the yellow 1Gbit light is lit. Plus, it's a brand new cable and I have tried multiple known working ports on my router. In /etc/network/interfaces it appears to be set up correctly as eth1 with the correct static IP, subnet mask, and default gateway for my LAN.

Do I need to download a driver for it? I have found a linux driver on Intel's website, but before I go through all that, I want to make sure that it is necessary. So far my Ubuntu experience has been painless and it has recognized every hardware device I have ever put into this machine without having to download and install any special drivers. I can't imagine a simple $25 Intel brand card wouldn't be recognized and work immediately.
Any suggestions from the experts?

[xtraspecialj]

My problem was a big ole' dumb human error on my part. I didn't realize my motherboard had 2 LAN interfaces on it. I was assuming that the new card was eth1, but it was in fact eth2. So all I had to do was go into /etc/network/interfaces and activate the eth2 interface and poof! it worked. Oh well, my dumb quota for the day may already be filled.

My linux noobness continues.