Re: [PATCH next v1] r8169: Fix PHY lookup for mdiobus_get_phy() and improve error reporting during probe

Hi Heiner,

On Tue, 17 Mar 2026 at 15:14, Heiner Kallweit [off-list ref] wrote:

On 17.03.2026 08:59, Anand Moon wrote:

quoted

Hi Heiner,

Thanks for your review comments.

On Tue, 17 Mar 2026 at 12:21, Heiner Kallweit [off-list ref] wrote:

quoted

On 17.03.2026 07:16, Anand Moon wrote:

quoted

The driver currently assumes the PHY is always at address 0. On some
hardware or buggy BIOS implementations, the PHY may reside at a
different address on the MDIO bus. Update r8169_mdio_register()
to scan the bus for the first available PHY instead of hardcoding
address 0.

No. The PHY always shows up at (virtual) address 0, due to the
MAC register based way of accessing the internal PHY.
Do you have any concrete example of such a "hardware or buggy bios"?

Sorry about that, I didn't realize. Unfortunately, my testing shows
this still doesn't
fix the problem, but I still perceive. I modeled the change after some
other drivers,
but clearly, that approach isn't working in this case.

quoted

quoted

This check is needed. It's seems your actual intention is something completely
different from what you state in the commit message. You try to find a workaround
for the issues with request_module() from async contect, caused by the referenced
change to Rockchip PCI.

That makes sense, sorry for the noise.

What are your thoughts on using dev_err_probe() for these registration failures?
I thought it might clean up the error path.

I'm not aware of any realistic scenario where these calls would fail (w/o printing
an error message before). So adding an error message wouldn't hurt, but it also
wouldn't be beneficial enough to justify a patch.

If we enable .probe_type = PROBE_PREFER_ASYNCHRONOUS in pcie-dw-rockchip.c,
The r8169 module probe will fail due to the module’s request for
synchronous probing.

[1] https://lore.kernel.org/all/87bc37ee-234c-4568-b72e-955c130a6838@arm.com/ (local)

Some were in the module, but the probe failed to load the module or firmware.
I hope these changes will resolve the probe warning.

----->8-----

diff --git a/drivers/net/ethernet/realtek/r8169_main.c

b/drivers/net/ethernet/realtek/r8169_main.c
index 791277e750ba..8b7858f6dc6d 100644

--- a/drivers/net/ethernet/realtek/r8169_main.c
+++ b/drivers/net/ethernet/realtek/r8169_main.c

@@ -5790,11 +5790,11 @@ static int rtl_init_one(struct pci_dev *pdev,

const struct pci_device_id *ent)

        rc = r8169_mdio_register(tp);
        if (rc)
-               return rc;
+               return dev_err_probe(&pdev->dev, rc, "mdio register failure\n");

        rc = register_netdev(dev);
        if (rc)
-               return rc;
+               return dev_err_probe(&pdev->dev, rc, "register newdev
failure\n");

        if (IS_ENABLED(CONFIG_R8169_LEDS)) {
                if (rtl_is_8125(tp))

Thanks
-Anand