From owner-freebsd-stable Fri Oct 18 9: 7:52 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 23E6B37B41E for ; Fri, 18 Oct 2002 09:07:47 -0700 (PDT) Received: from wall.polstra.com (wall-gw.polstra.com [206.213.73.130]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id F0B0843E97 for ; Fri, 18 Oct 2002 09:07:45 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jdp@polstra.com) Received: from vashon.polstra.com (vashon.polstra.com [206.213.73.13]) by wall.polstra.com (8.11.3/8.11.3) with ESMTP id g9IG7fx37354; Fri, 18 Oct 2002 09:07:41 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jdp@vashon.polstra.com) Received: (from jdp@localhost) by vashon.polstra.com (8.12.5/8.12.5/Submit) id g9IG7eGK028163; Fri, 18 Oct 2002 09:07:40 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jdp) Date: Fri, 18 Oct 2002 09:07:40 -0700 (PDT) Message-Id: <200210181607.g9IG7eGK028163@vashon.polstra.com> To: stable@freebsd.org From: John Polstra Cc: jamie@jamiesdomain.org.uk Subject: Re: Compaq GIGA NIC In-Reply-To: <001501c275eb$a9328560$3264a8c0@BONG> References: <001501c275eb$a9328560$3264a8c0@BONG> Organization: Polstra & Co., Seattle, WA Sender: owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG In article <001501c275eb$a9328560$3264a8c0@BONG>, Jamie Heckford wrote: > > > From: Jamie Heckford [mailto:jamie@jamiesdomain.org.uk] > > > > > > Urgh - The broadcom chips perform terribly! > > > > I'm curious why you say that. I have a large number of both > > Last time we tried this driver (around 4.6-RELEASE) we had massive > problems with the chipset occasionally incorrectly checking TCP > checksums... which caused the interface to lock up. > > I think someone posted a workaround to disable the hardware checksum > checking feature - but we only had these cards onboard in our > production servers. > > Maybe its corrected now... who knows?? By the sounds of it you > aren't having any issues :-) So you ran into a driver bug, and you describe it by saying "The broadcom chips perform terribly!" ??? No wonder there's so much misinformation on the net. Sheesh, try to remember that this stuff gets archived! People read it and believe it, and nobody benefits when it's just not true. I've been working with both the various models of Broadcom and Intel gigabit NICs for close to 2 years in a setup where it's possible to measure their performance accurately under controlled conditions. The Broadcom chips perform on a par with the Intel chips under all circumstances. With certain kinds of traffic, the Broadcom chips perform measurably better. If you are running into trouble with the Broadcom chips, it's because of _bugs_ in the driver (or because of the lack of the necessary work-arounds for chip bugs). Those bugs exist because, just like Intel, Broadcom won't release the technical details of the chips without an NDA. Don't confuse driver problems with chip problems. John -- John Polstra John D. Polstra & Co., Inc. Seattle, Washington USA "Disappointment is a good sign of basic intelligence." -- Chögyam Trungpa To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message