Date: Sat, 3 Jun 2006 09:28:42 -0700 (PDT) From: Danial Thom <danial_thom@yahoo.com> To: Steve Kargl <sgk@troutmask.apl.washington.edu>, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Tuning GigE network for cluster computing? Message-ID: <20060603162842.24827.qmail@web33307.mail.mud.yahoo.com> In-Reply-To: <20060603153847.GA36267@troutmask.apl.washington.edu>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
--- Steve Kargl <sgk@troutmask.apl.washington.edu> wrote: > First, I'm running FreeBSD 6.1-stable on a > small cluster > with 6 nodes that contain Tyan motheriboards. > These broads > have Broadcom GigE NICs that use the bge > device. > > The cluster will be using MPI to possibly shove > large data > sets through a GigE switch, so I'm trying to > determine how > best to optimize the transfer. > > Would DEVICE_POLLING and/or jumbo frames likely > methods for > enhanced speeds? > > -- > Steve --- Steve Kargl <sgk@troutmask.apl.washington.edu> wrote: > First, I'm running FreeBSD 6.1-stable on a > small cluster > with 6 nodes that contain Tyan motheriboards. > These broads > have Broadcom GigE NICs that use the bge > device. > > The cluster will be using MPI to possibly shove > large data > sets through a GigE switch, so I'm trying to > determine how > best to optimize the transfer. > > Would DEVICE_POLLING and/or jumbo frames likely > methods for > enhanced speeds? Firstly we've been discussing how bad and inefficient the broadcom controllers are. If you have a tyan MB with onboard controllers they are incredibly slow (ie inefficient), as well as being quirky. If you have a PCI-X slot put in an intel card. They have built-in interrupt moderation so you don't have dick around with polling. A 133Mhz intel controller (make sure they have the GB chips on them and not the EB) will use half the cpu of the on-board broadcoms. If you don't believe try it with one box and measure the cpu usage before and after. Its worth the $50. investment in the card, believe me. While polling may marginally decrease the cpu load (depending on how bad FreeBSD 6.1 is on interrupt overhead), its also going to add latency to the processing of packets, which is the opposite of what you want to do. DT __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20060603162842.24827.qmail>