Re: [Bug 1063038] Re: Broadcom BCM57780 Cannot Connect at Gigabit Speed using tg3 module.

On Tue, 2012-10-16 at 16:08 -0700, Justin Chudgar wrote: 

With that said, though, I wish to express my displeasure with this
practice artificially limiting the performance and/or capabilities of
hardware via hidden firmware settings. It seems to be thoroughly
contrary to both the liberty intended by Free Software and to the
liberty to use purchased goods in any legal manner.

The end result that since Acer decided to deceptively limit hardware
function via firmware, presumably to generate artificial pricepoint
differentiation, Broadcom (not you guys) will agree not to fully support
their hardware reflects poorly on Broadcom as well as Acer. I know that
this will make me hesitant to buy devices from Acer or those
incorporating Broadcom hardware. 

Firmware plays no role here.  It is their hardware design on the board
or on the RJ45 connector that makes 1Gbps not possible.  I wasn't aware
of this until now because Acer did not even require Linux support on
these systems.  So the right thing to do for these systems is to
recognize them as 10/100Mbps capable devices in the tg3 driver.