Certain external network adapters may cause network issues on Mac devices

Products

• Endpoint Protection

Issue/Introduction

Certain external network adapters, such as an OWC dock, may cause Internet connection issues on Mac devices.

Environment

The issue may appear on macOS 11.x and later releases.

Resolution

To confirm that the problem is caused by a driver incompatibility:

1. Go to "System Report" (Apple icon on the top menu bar > About This Mac > System Report).
2. In the left pane, select "Hardware > Ethernet Cards".
3. In the devices list on the right, select "ethernet", and see if the "Driver" field in the lower panel says "com.apple.DriverKit-AppleEthernetE1000".
   
   

To work around the issue:

1. Launch the Terminal app, and run:

   nvram -p | grep boot-args

   Note down any existing boot args after the "boot-args" tag. (By default, there are no "boot-args".)
2. Boot the machine into Recovery Mode.
   https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201314
   https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/macos-recovery-a-mac-apple-silicon-mchl82829c17/11.0/mac/11.0#mchl5abfbb29
3. From Recovery Mode launch Utilities > Terminal from the top menu bar, and then run:

   nvram boot-args="[existing boot-args] dk.e1000=0"

   Replace the "existing boot-args" in the above command with the ones that you noted down earlier.
4. Reboot machine into a normal mode, check the "System Report" again and make sure that the driver for the ethernet is not "com.apple.DriverKit-AppleEthernetE1000" anymore.