Supported NICs

Jason Bacon bacon at uwm.edu
Wed Mar 19 17:27:27 UTC 2014


We finally got a new server in with a ConnectX-3 card.  It seems to work 
reliably with our SilverStorm DDR network using a CX4 - QSFP cable.

Below are specs and iperf benchmarks between the FreeBSD server and a 
CentOS 6.5 compute node with a Qlogic DDR card.  Connected mode with MTU 
65520.  FreeBSD 10.0-RELEASE on a Dell R720xd.

Wondering if anyone has any suggestions about what might cause the poor 
output performance.  Any sysctls or loader.conf settings I should look 
into?  None of the kern.conftext flags mentioned below are present.

Any pointers on how to diagnose the issue would be appreciated as well.

Thanks,

     Jason

Input throughput is excellent - over 11 gb/sec.  Linux to Linux on the 
same network does about 10 gb/sec.

[root at compute-5-33 ~]# iperf -c 10.1.2.250
------------------------------------------------------------
Client connecting to 10.1.2.250, TCP port 5001
TCP window size:  645 KByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------
[  3] local 10.1.2.140 port 54223 connected with 10.1.2.250 port 5001
[ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
[  3]  0.0-10.0 sec  13.0 GBytes  11.2 Gbits/sec


bacon at raid1:~ % netstat 1
             input        (Total)           output
    packets  errs idrops      bytes    packets  errs bytes colls
      10631     0     0  685149597       5390     0 409806     0
      22281     0     0 1452318244      11136     0 846730     0
      23776     0     0 1557833160      11884     0 903654     0
      23891     0     0 1565368420      11952     0 907986     0
      23328     0     0 1528478408      11663     0 886554     0

Output throughput is terrible:

[root at compute-5-33 ~]# iperf -s
------------------------------------------------------------
Server listening on TCP port 5001
TCP window size: 85.3 KByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------
[  4] local 10.1.2.140 port 5001 connected with 10.1.2.250 port 50207
[ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
[  4]  0.0-10.9 sec  1.50 MBytes  1.16 Mbits/sec


bacon at raid1:~ % netstat 1
             input        (Total)           output
    packets  errs idrops      bytes    packets  errs bytes colls
         20     0     0       1444         27     1 124684     0
          5     0     0        284          1     4 393718     0
          5     0     0        284          1     4 393718     0
          6     0     0        344          1     4 393718     0
          6     0     0        344         18     4 426562     0
          5     0     0        284          1     4 393718     0

root at raid1:/home/bacon # ibstat
CA 'mlx4_0'
     CA type: MT4099
     Number of ports: 1
     Firmware version: 2.11.500
     Hardware version: 0
     Node GUID: 0xf4521403007d2c10
     System image GUID: 0xf4521403007d2c13
     Port 1:
         State: Active
         Physical state: LinkUp
         Rate: 20
         Base lid: 163
         LMC: 0
         SM lid: 1
         Capability mask: 0x02514868
         Port GUID: 0xf4521403007d2c11

root at raid1:/home/bacon # ibportstate -G 0xf4521403007d2c11 query
PortInfo:
# Port info: Lid 163 port 0
LinkState:.......................Active
PhysLinkState:...................LinkUp
LinkWidthSupported:..............4X (IBA extension)
LinkWidthEnabled:................4X
LinkWidthActive:.................4X
LinkSpeedSupported:..............2.5 Gbps or 5.0 Gbps or 10.0 Gbps
LinkSpeedEnabled:................2.5 Gbps or 5.0 Gbps or 10.0 Gbps
LinkSpeedActive:.................5.0 Gbps




On 10/16/13 10:23, Oded Shanoon wrote:
> Please run sysctl kern.conftxt and grep for the following options:
>
> OFED_DEBUG_INIT
> IPOIB_DEBUG
> DEADLKRES
> INVARIANTS
> INVARIANT_SUPPORT
> WITNESS
> WITNESS_SKIPSPIN
>
> These could result in performance degredation
>
> Regards,
>
> Oded Shanoon
> OFED-FreeBSD Team Leader
> Mellanox Technologies, Raanana
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jason Bacon [mailto:bacon at uwm.edu]
> Sent: Monday, October 14, 2013 9:37 PM
> To: Oded Shanoon
> Cc: Jason Bacon; Anthony Cornehl; freebsd-infiniband at freebsd.org
> Subject: Re: Supported NICs
>
>
> Some initial test results...
>
> I installed an old Infinihost DDR HCA in one of our compute nodes running FreeBSD 9.1.
>
> RHEL nodes are using qlogic IB HCAs.
>
> 10.1.1 is gigabit Ethernet, 10.1.2 is IB.
>
> Running iperf server on FreeBSD and client on one of our RHEL nodes shows OK performance:
>
> bacon at infinibsd:/home/bacon % iperf -s
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Server listening on TCP port 5001
> TCP window size: 64.0 KByte (default)
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> [  4] local 10.1.1.140 port 5001 connected with 10.1.1.39 port 35947
> [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
> [  4]  0.0-10.0 sec  1.10 GBytes   947 Mbits/sec
>
> [  5] local 10.1.2.140 port 5001 connected with 10.1.2.39 port 60090 [  5]  0.0-10.0 sec  7.20 GBytes  6.18 Gbits/sec
>
> RHEL to RHEL gives us about 8 Gbits/sec.
>
> Iperf server on RHEL and client on FreeBSD shows very poor performance for IB, while GigE is fine:
>
> bacon at infinibsd:/home/bacon % iperf -c 10.1.1.39
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Client connecting to 10.1.1.39, TCP port 5001 TCP window size: 32.8 KByte (default)
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> [  3] local 10.1.1.140 port 60066 connected with 10.1.1.39 port 5001
> [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
> [  3]  0.0-10.0 sec  1.10 GBytes   943 Mbits/sec
>
> bacon at infinibsd:/home/bacon % iperf -c 10.1.2.39
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Client connecting to 10.1.2.39, TCP port 5001 TCP window size: 32.0 KByte (default)
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> [  3] local 10.1.2.140 port 14608 connected with 10.1.2.39 port 5001
> [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
> [  3]  0.0-32.7 sec   768 KBytes   192 Kbits/sec
>
> Any ideas what might cause this?
>
> I'm going to install 9.2-RELEASE and retest in any case, plus explore the ib config tools, but any feedback in the meantime would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
>
>       JB
>
> On 10/07/13 01:51, Oded Shanoon wrote:
>> Hi Jason,
>>
>> IB support in 9.2 is supposed to be stable enough.
>> Please note that Mellanox started supporting FreeBSD only recently. The driver in 9.2 was ported by someone from Isilon (Jeff Roberson) from OFA-1.5.3.
>> Since we started our involvement we entered some fixes to that driver (that were submitted into 9.2).
>> We also mapped various issues which needs to be fixed in the future.
>> We are now working on a major "face lift" to the driver - making it much more stable and with improved performance and features.
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Oded Shanoon
>> OFED-FreeBSD Team Leader
>> Mellanox Technologies, Raanana
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: owner-freebsd-infiniband at freebsd.org
>> [mailto:owner-freebsd-infiniband at freebsd.org] On Behalf Of Jason Bacon
>> Sent: Monday, September 16, 2013 4:32 PM
>> To: Anthony Cornehl
>> Cc: freebsd-infiniband at freebsd.org
>> Subject: Re: Supported NICs
>>
>>
>> Thanks Anthony&  Oded!
>>
>> Would you say that IB support in 9.2 is stable enough for a production HPC file server?
>>
>> Will do plenty of my own testing first, of course.
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>>        Jason
>>
>> On 09/15/13 22:38, Anthony Cornehl wrote:
>>> On Sep 15, 2013 8:17 PM, "Anthony Cornehl"<accornehl at gmail.com
>>> <mailto:accornehl at gmail.com>>  wrote:
>>>> On Sep 15, 2013 1:20 PM, "Jason bacon"<jwbacon at tds.net
>>> <mailto:jwbacon at tds.net>>  wrote:
>>>>> Is there a list of supported IB NICs out there somewhere?
>>>>>
>>>>> I followed the wiki instructions for rebuilding with IB support
>>> and now have mlx4ib, mlxen, etc.
>>>>> Was hoping there would be man pages for the drivers that list
>>> known working cards, but there don't seem to be.  I'm hoping to test
>>> a file server using IPOIB and possible roll a FreeNAS ISO with IB
>>> support if it works out.
>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>>>>>     Jason W. Bacon
>>>>> jwbacon at tds.net<mailto:jwbacon at tds.net>
>>>>>
>>>>>     Circumstances don't make a man:
>>>>>     They reveal him.
>>>>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> freebsd-infiniband at freebsd.org
>>> <mailto:freebsd-infiniband at freebsd.org>  mailing list
>>>>> http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-infiniband
>>>>> To unsubscribe, send any mail to
>>> "freebsd-infiniband-unsubscribe at freebsd.org
>>> <mailto:freebsd-infiniband-unsubscribe at freebsd.org>"
>>>> Hey Jason,
>>>>
>>>> Mellanox ConnectX series cards are the only ones supported currently...
>>>>
>>>> http://www.mellanox.com/page/infiniband_cards_overview
>>>>
>>>> Don't forget to compile with IPoIB as well, since the IPoIB support
>>> is compiled into the driver, unlike in Linux.
>>>> Just be aware that IPoIB performance is also improved by enabling
>>> connected mode when you compile the kernel module. The IB code in
>>> FreeBSD is a few years older the what is in Linux, but, the following
>>> forum thread is probably relevant...
>>> http://forums.servethehome.com/networking/1554-infiniband-ipoib-perfo
>>> r
>>> mance-problems.html
>>>> Cheers!
>>> It also appears that Jeff fixed SDP a few weeks ago, which is more
>>> capable of reaching line-speed for IB-connected devices.
>>>
>>> http://pkg-ofed.alioth.debian.org/howto/infiniband-howto-7.html
>>>
>>> Cheers!
>>>
>> --
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>>      Jason W. Bacon
>>      jwbacon at tds.net
>>
>>      Circumstances don't make a man:
>>      They reveal him.
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> freebsd-infiniband at freebsd.org mailing list
>> http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-infiniband
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>



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