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Support for Aquantia AQC113 and AQC113C Ethernet Controllers on FreeBSD

2026-03-073:551610github.com

Here’s the revised request formatted for a GitHub issue: Description: This is a feature request to add driver support for the Aquantia AQC113 and AQC113C Ethernet controllers in FreeBSD. These devi...

Here’s the revised request formatted for a GitHub issue:

Description:

This is a feature request to add driver support for the Aquantia AQC113 and AQC113C Ethernet controllers in FreeBSD. These devices are widely used in modern high-performance networking scenarios, and adding support would enhance FreeBSD's hardware compatibility for servers, NAS systems, and workstations.

Current Behavior:

  • The devices are detected by the system but show no driver attached when checked via pciconf or dmesg.
  • The aquantia-atlantic-kmod driver does not currently support the AQC113 family.

Example pciconf -lv output:

none3@pci0:7:0:0: class=0x020000 rev=0x03 hdr=0x00 vendor=0x1d6a device=0x14c0 subvendor=0x1d6a subdevice=0x0001
    vendor     = 'Aquantia Corp.'
    device     = 'AQC113C NBase-T/IEEE 802.3an Ethernet Controller [Marvell Scalable mGig]'
    class      = network
    subclass   = ethernet

Expected Behavior:

The AQC113 and AQC113C devices should be recognized and functional under FreeBSD, with support for the advanced features these controllers offer, such as NBase-T and 10GBase-T networking.

Additional Context:

  1. Device Details:

    • Vendor: Aquantia Corp. (Marvell)
    • PCI IDs:
      • AQC113: 0x04c0
      • AQC113C: 0x14c0
    • Found in devices like the ASUS XG-C100C v2.

  2. Relevant Resources:

    • OpenBSD’s aq driver supports AQC113 and AQC113C (source code).
    • Linux’s atlantic driver includes support for these devices.

  3. Use Cases:

    • Deployment in high-performance environments such as NAS systems, workstations, and enterprise servers.
    • Increasing adoption of AQC113-based hardware, particularly for 10G networking.

  4. FreeBSD’s Current Limitations:

    • The current aquantia-atlantic-kmod driver supports the AQC107 family but not the AQC113.

Request:

Please consider adding support for the AQC113 family to the aquantia-atlantic-kmod driver or create a new driver for these devices. If testing or hardware access is required, I am happy to assist in debugging and validation.

Logs & System Details:

  • FreeBSD Version: 14.1
  • Relevant Commands:
    • pciconf -lv: See above example.
    • dmesg | grep -i ethernet: Reports devices as detected but unsupported.

Thank you for your time and consideration. Adding support for the AQC113 family would be a significant enhancement to FreeBSD’s hardware compatibility.


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justinclift

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Comments

  • By justinclift 2026-03-073:55

    Useful for anyone using FreeBSD with one of the 10GbE chipsets, as commonly found in minipcs these days.

    This driver seems to be working well for people. :)

  • By AdrianB1 2026-03-119:532 reply

    Just curious, most people that use FreeBSD are either experts or hardcode enthusiasts. It used to include FreeNAS/TrueNAS users, but they migrated to Linux as the product moved to Linux. That means the users of FreeBSD are not the ones I would expect to purchase and use these controllers, but other options like 10 Gbps with SFP+ (AOC or Fiber Optic) or even 25Gbps and higher. Is there a significant demand for this driver? A 10 Gbps SFP+ card is cheaper and more flexible, I have a few in several computers and even a few laying around as spares, they are also more compatible with all sorts of OS-es and usually more capable.

    • By justinclift 2026-03-1112:09

      Quite a lot of popular, widely deployed firewalls are based upon FreeBSD.

      And for them it's a problem that miniPCs well suited for firewall use have been been coming out (for a while now) using this chipset. Which FreeBSD didn't support.

      So for those projects, this may provide an avenue of hope or future potential. ;)

    • By adrian_b 2026-03-1116:54

      I use cards like those described by you (with DAC cables) for connections between FreeBSD servers (actually between servers, regardless if they run FreeBSD or Linux).

      However, I also need to connect some desktop/laptop PCs to a FreeBSD server, either for management or for transferring backups, where a cheaper Aquantia NIC is perfectly adequate, especially when the PC has only a 2.5 Gb/s or 5 Gb/s Ethernet interface.

      In the past, I had to buy an Intel server NIC for one of my FreeBSD servers, despite the fact that I had a spare Aquantia NIC that would have worked fine, due to this driver problem.

      I was not happy about it, so I am glad to hear now that a working driver is available.

  • By amelius 2026-03-118:432 reply

    Shouldn't AI be smart enough now to translate drivers from Linux to FreeBSD? It's mostly plumbing after all.

    • By AdrianB1 2026-03-119:461 reply

      No, AI is anything but "smart". And my understanding is that the network stack is so well done in FreeBSD that it is a shame to touch it with AI code.

      • By amelius 2026-03-119:561 reply

        Well it doesn't cost much to try it, and you can always replace it by a handcrafted version later.

        • By quietsegfault 2026-03-1110:54

          It cost me my weekly Claude usage! I was on Claude timeout for like 4 days.

    • By quietsegfault 2026-03-1110:54

      I had one of these interfaces and the driver kept freezing in Linux. Me ‘n Claude were not able to figure out why. Super sad.

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