Dell Brocade Adapters Installation And Reference Manual page 53

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Brocade Adapters Installation and Reference Manual
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Interrupt moderation
Implements dynamic selection interrupt coalescing values based on traffic and system load
profiles. Traffic is continuously monitored to place in categories between "high throughput
sensitive" and "high latency sensitive." Similarly, the host system is monitored regularly to
place it in categories between "highly loaded" and "minimally loaded." The driver dynamically
selects interrupt coalescing values based on this profiling.
MSI-X
This is an extended version of Message Signaled Interrupts (MSI), defined in the PCI 3.0
specification. MSI-X helps improve overall system performance by contributing to lower
interrupt latency and improved utilization of the host CPU. MSI-X is supported by Linux RHEL5,
SLES 10 and 11, Windows 2008, and ESX 4.0 and 4.1.
Network Boot (PXE and UNDI)
The preboot execution environment (PXE) mechanism, embedded in the CNA firmware,
provides the ability to boot the host operating system from a system located on the LAN
instead of the over the SAN or from host's local disk. UNDI (universal network device interface)
is an application program interface (API) used by the PXE protocol to enable basic control of I/O
and performs other administrative chores like setting up the MAC address and retrieving
statistics through the adapter. UNDI drivers are embedded in the CNA firmware.
Network Priority
The CNA and Fabric Adapter port configured in CNA mode support this feature, which provides
a mechanism to enable DCB flow control (802.1Qbb Priority-based Flow Control: Pause
802.1p) on network traffic. In addition, it guarantees mutual exclusion of FCoE and network
priorities to ensure proper enhanced transmission selection (ETS). This feature is not
supported on HBAs or Fabric Adapter ports configured in HBA mode.
This feature does not need enabled on the CNA, Fabric Adapter port configured in CNA mode,
or switch. Specific DCB attributes, including priorities for FCoE traffic, are configured on the
FCoE switch. These attributes propagate to the CNA DCB port through the DCBCXP. Adapter
firmware processes this information and derives priorities for network traffic. The network
driver is notified of the network priority and tags both FCoE and network frames with their
priorities.
Priority-based flow control (802.1Qbb)
Defines eight priority levels to allow eight independent lossless virtual lanes. Pauses traffic
based on the priority levels and restarts traffic through a high-level pause algorithm.
Receive side scaling (RSS) feature for advanced link layer
Enables receive processing to be balanced across multiple processors while maintaining
in-order delivery of data, parallel execution, and dynamic load balancing.
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Adapter features
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