Date: Fri, 2 Jun 2006 10:58:51 -0700 (PDT) From: Danial Thom <danial_thom@yahoo.com> To: Ted Mittelstaedt <tedm@toybox.placo.com>, Heinrich Rebehn <rebehn@ant.uni-bremen.de>, questions@freebsd.org Subject: RE: Recommendation for 1000BASE-SX card? Message-ID: <20060602175851.12924.qmail@web33310.mail.mud.yahoo.com> In-Reply-To: <LOBBIFDAGNMAMLGJJCKNCEAPFEAA.tedm@toybox.placo.com>
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--- Ted Mittelstaedt <tedm@toybox.placo.com> wrote: > > > >-----Original Message----- > >From: owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org > >[mailto:owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org]On > Behalf Of Danial Thom > >Sent: Thursday, June 01, 2006 6:38 AM > >To: Heinrich Rebehn; questions@freebsd.org > >Subject: Re: Recommendation for 1000BASE-SX > card? > > > > > > > > > >--- Heinrich Rebehn <rebehn@ant.uni-bremen.de> > >wrote: > > > >> Danial Thom wrote: > >> > The intel cards that use the EM driver > are > >> the > >> > best performing cards in FreeBSD that > we've > >> > tested. We've test cards made by the same > >> company > >> > that use the broadcom controllers and the > >> intel > >> > cards are substantially better (ie use > less > >> CPU > >> > passing the same amount of traffic). > >> > > >> > Be careful using on-board controllers. > >> Usually > >> > vendors, for some reason, don't wire them > to > >> the > >> > pci-x bus. Most supermicro boards wire the > em > >> > controllers to the 32bit/33mhz bus and the > >> tyan > >> > and supermicro opteron boards we've tested > >> wire > >> > the broadcoms to a shared 1x PCI-E, both > of > >> which > >> > will not only give you poor performance, > but > >> are > >> > not capable of running full gigabit rates. > >> > > >> > DT > >> > > >> > >> The Intel card would be an INTEL Pro1000MF, > >> right? This would be quite > >> expensive (~ EUR 430), but good performance > and > >> stability would warrant > >> that. > >> ATM, we are using the onboard controller > >> (Broadcom BCM5704C wired to the > >> pci-x bus). I did not have opportunity to do > >> performance measurements, > >> but we do have problems with our Linkpro > >> 1000SX/1000TX converters, the > >> 3rd of which has already died. > >> That's why i want to give a PCI-X card with > >> fiber interface a try. > > > >No, that would be the 1000MT, the MF is a > fiber > >card I believe. They are about US$120. in the > US. > > > >How do you know its wired to the PCI-X bus, > since > >I don't believe that the controller has a way > of > >reporting the way that the intel controller > does? > >What MB do you have? > > > >Also keep in mind that the bge driver is a > piece > >of crap; driver quality is a much more telling > >factor in these free OS's than the card in > many > >cases. The EM and FXP are the only drivers > worth > >anything (mainly because neither were written > by > >mass-driver mill man Bill Paul). > > > > After having fixed bugs in the bge driver I > must stress > how wrong this statement is for the bge driver. > Bill > Paul may or may not have been associated with > the bge driver, > whether he was or not is immaterial since the > bge driver is > basically a port of the broadcom-supplied Linux > driver, > the code is Broadcoms mostly, with hunks of > Broadcom > code removed (like that dealing with the PHY's) > when it > was too difficult to port. (apparently) The > quality of > the Broadcom driver isn't Bill Paul's, it's > Broadcoms. > > No, I can assure you that the reason the > Broadcom > chips work like crap under FreeBSD is not due > to Bill Paul, > it is because the Broadcom hardware iteself is > pure, unadulterated, > stinking, bull crap. It is crappy even under > the supported operating > systems like Windows, it's craptitude reaches > new heights on > the crap pile. Broadcom missed their calling > as an ethernet > chipset designer, they should have gone into > making vacuum > cleaners, as they would certainly be the > suckiest ones in > that business. > > Ted I'll disagree with you on the authoring issue (without commenting on the crappiness of the controller), because it is ultimately the responsibility of the programmer to work around the quirks and even the bugs in any given controller, and the simple fact is that BP does a half-assed job; certainly not the kind of job someone whose sole responsibility was to maintain a particular driver. All complex controllers are a b*tch to write drivers for, and the ability to seemlessly integrate working code into the OS to mask the quirks is what separates the men from the boys. Saying the driver stinks because the example code stinks is a cop-out. All sample code stinks. The sample code should be just that; an example of how to program the controller. Taking example code and forcing it into a driver results in a garbage driver. Which is also why the strategy of hiring some "starving programmer" is not a viable option,since the talent of the programmer is directly proportiate to the quality of the finished driver. The margin between marginal programmers (guys that can get something done that "works") and a superior programmer is very large. We're not talking about welders here. There could be a 50% performance difference between 2 drivers for the same controller written by programmers with different talent levels. A couple of fewer or more efficient I/Os, a better way to allocate memory, how you flip the rings; all can make a tremendous difference, particularly when you get to the 100K+ iterations per second levels of traffic. DT __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
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