Broadcom NetXtreme II SERIES User Manual

VMware Driver Software: Broadcom NetXtreme II® Network Adapter User Guide
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VMware Driver Software: Broadcom NetXtreme II
®
Network Adapter User Guide
Packaging
Networking Support
Drivers
FCoE Support
Packaging
The VMware driver is released in the packaging formats shown in Table 1.
Table 1: VMware Driver Packaging
Format Drivers
Compressed tar bnx2x-version.tar.gz
VMware VIB vmware-esx-drivers-net-bnx2x-version.x86_64.vib
Networking Support
This section describes the bnx2x VMware ESX driver for the Broadcom NetXtreme II PCIE 10 GbE network adapters.
Drivers
Download, Install, and Update Drivers
To download, install, or update the VMware ESX/ESXi driver for NetXtreme II 10 GbE network adapters, see http://www.vmware.com/support.
Driver Parameters
Several optional parameters can be supplied as a command line argument to the vmkload_mod command. These parameters can also be set via the esxcfg-module
command. See the man page for more information.
int_mode
The optional parameter int_mode is used to force using an interrupt mode other than MSI-X. By default, the driver will try to enable MSI-X if it is supported by the
kernel. If MSI-X is not attainable, then the driver will try to enable MSI if it is supported by the kernel. If MSI is not attainable, then the driver will use the legacy
INTx mode.
Set the int_mode parameter to 1 as shown below to force using the legacy INTx mode on all NetXtreme II network adapters in the system.
vmkload_mod bnx2x int_mode=1
Set the int_mode parameter to 2 as shown below to force using MSI mode on all NetXtreme II network adapters in the system.
vmkload_mod bnx2x int_mode=2
disable_tpa
The optional parameter disable_tpa can be used to disable the Transparent Packet Aggregation (TPA) feature. By default, the driver will aggregate TCP packets,
but if you would like to disable this advanced feature, it can be done.
Set the disable_tpa parameter to 1 as shown below to disable the TPA feature on all NetXtreme II network adapters in the system.
vmkload_mod bnx2x.ko disable_tpa=1
Use ethtool to disable TPA (LRO) for a specific network adapter.
num_rx_queues
The optional parameter num_rx_queues may be used to set the number of Rx queues on kernels starting from 2.6.24 when multi_mode is set to 1 and interrupt
mode is MSI-X. Number of Rx queues must be equal to or greater than the number of Tx queues (see num_tx_queues parameter). If the interrupt mode is
different than MSI-X (see int_mode parameter), then then the number of Rx queues will be set to 1, discarding the value of this parameter.
num_tx_queues
The optional parameter num_tx_queues may be used to set the number of Tx queues on kernels starting from 2.6.27 when multi_mode is set to 1 and interrupt
mode is MSI-X. The number of Rx queues must be equal to or greater than the number of Tx queues (see num_rx_queues parameter). If the interrupt mode is
different than MSI-X (see int_mode parameter), then the number of Tx queues will be set to 1, discarding the value of this parameter.
pri_map
The optional parameter pri_map is used to map the VLAN PRI value or the IP DSCP value to a different or the same CoS in the hardware. This 32-bit parameter is
evaluated by the driver as 8 values of 4 bits each. Each nibble sets the desired hardware queue number for that priority.
For example, set the pri_map parameter to 0x22221100 to map priority 0 and 1 to CoS 0, map priority 2 and 3 to CoS 1, and map priority 4 to 7 to CoS 2. In
another example, set the pri_map parameter to 0x11110000 to map priority 0 to 3 to CoS 0, and map priority 4 to 7 to CoS 1.
qs_per_cos

Broadcom NetXtreme II SERIES Specifications

General

Brand	Broadcom
Model	NetXtreme II SERIES
Category	Network Card
Language	English