ix? / Intel(R) PRO/10GbE

[Steven Hartland]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Teske, Devin"

> On Tue, 12 Feb 2013, Daniel Braniss wrote:
>
>> > On Tue, 12 Feb 2013, Daniel Braniss wrote:
>> >
>> > > I finally got a 10G card that is recognized by FreeBSD (9.1-stable):
>> > > ...
>> > > ix0: <Intel(R) PRO/10GbE PCI-Express Network Driver, Version - 2.4.8> port
>> > > 0xecc0-0xecdf mem 0xd9e80000-0xd9efffff,0xd9ff8000-0xd9ffbfff irq 40 at d=evice
>> > > 0.0 on pci4
>> > > ix0: Using MSIX interrupts with 9 vectors
>> > > ix0: RX Descriptors exceed system mbuf max, using default instead!
>> >
>> > From reading sys/dev/ixgbe/README:
>> >
>> > echo "kern.ipc.nmbclusters=262144" >> /etc/sysctl.conf
>> > echo "kern.ipc.nmbjumbop=262144" >> /etc/sysctl.conf
>> > reboot
>>
>> but this only works if the driver is loaded after
>> the sysctl is executed!
>> it's better to put it in /boot/loader.conf
>
> Not necessarily, it depends when the driver grabs the mbufs. In the case of the igb/ixgb/ixgbe drivers, this happens when the 
> interface is brought up (not when the driver is loaded, nor when the driver probes/attaches a PHY). In other words, you don't 
> have to worry about mbuf exhaustion until you say "ifconfig ix0 up" (in the case of ixgbe, bringing up even a single interface 
> is enough through the default mbufs and require more).
>
> Since sysctl.conf is processed before the network is brought up, putting the parameters in sysctl.conf will be perfectly 
> suitable for most needs (unless for some strange reason you need to "up" an interface before sysctl.conf is processed).

That wasn't the case for ix for 8.3, not sure if its changed recently but
without setting it in loader.conf the interface would error.

    Regards
    Steve 


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