I'm currently getting a strange issue with the on-board ethernet adapter on my older secondary system I use in the living room that I use for mainly just desktop apps.
Before upgrading to Windows 10 pro x64 yesterday I was running Windows 7 Ultimate x64 on this system and everything was working just fine, including the ethernet adapter. When I upgraded yesterday, at first all drivers downloaded and installed correctly despite some components in this system being from 2006, compliments for the great compatibility. The ethernet adapter also had a working driver and was working fine. However when I restarted the system things got weird. The BIOS booted normally, then I briefly saw the windows 10 logo and loading icon, but they looked artifacted, the screen went black and nothing booted up. Because of the artifacts I thought the GPU may have died. I turned the PC off with the power button, and turned it on again. This time the windows logo was normal and windows booted up normally with one exception, no internet connection. Turns out that the on board ethernet device was 'not connected' according to the hidden devices in device manager, as if I unplugged it. Luckily I could still use internet as the PC also has a backup PCI wireless network card, I'd rather use wired internet anyway. So I left the PC unplugged for 1 night, when I turned it on again in the morning, the on-board ethernet adapter was working again. When I restarted, same routine, artifacted windows logo, black screen, restart, working windows but no ethernet adapter. Fixed again by unplugging the PC, and starting again.
I understand this may be a simple motherboard malfunction of some sort, the strange this is that it worked fine until I upgraded to windows 10. It's hard to believe that the ethernet adapter or motherboard decided to malfuntion at the same moment I upgraded windows, even though possible with an older system like this.
The GPU seems to be fine, even under stress, so I think the PCI-E controller can be ruled out. Also the GPU does not have any blown capacitors or anything. Also no blown capacitors on the mobo. I'm writing this post on the same PC with a working ethernet adapted for the moment. Running stable for several hours now while I've been exploring the new features, but the issue will occur again on restart.
By the way the thernet adapter is an on-board Marvell Yukon 88E8056 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller.
what are your thoughts. Old PC chose to malfunction at exactly this time? Or some strange software/hardware incompatibility issue.
Thanks for your replies.