AIX

Do you have SRIOV-capable LAN adapters?

Hi agent.kgb,

Yes all the quad port adapters (4x10Gb Fiber, 1x1Gb Copper) are SRIOV capable, so I have decided to adopt the following model at a HIGH level. I'll get down to the detail planning when I start the build process, currently each box will host around 20 LPAR's and unfortunately due to some major firmware issues with the SVC's we will not be using LPM to move stuff around - so a lot of planning here.

Currently the plan is to use 2 adapters per VIOS, this will give me 8x10Gb ports per VIOS, these will be configured as either one or two ether channels (most likely one)as per the diagram very kindly sent by xray.

So when I have the high level drawings complete I'll attach them to the post for information.

Regards

Gull04

If you have SR-IOV-capable adapter, don't make SEA and follow advices and schemes, made for standard Ethernet adapters. If you don't need LPM, configure SR-IOV's VFs on an HMC and assign them directly to LPARs. If you need HA between 2 adapters, make a NIB with a ping address. It takes less CPU and provides more network performance.

Hi Folks,

Here is a quick diagram of what is planned - just for the 10GbE network. I have to draw separate diagrams for all the individual sub-systems.

@agent.kgb, Sorry I didn't make myself clear on the previous mail. The full job is actually the replacement of two P770+ servers with three S824's, but due to problems with the existing SVC's we are unable to use LPM for the actual migrations. Once we have relocated the applications workloads to the new tin - then LPM will be used.

Regards

Gull04

770 to 824 migration? my condolences to your customer.

Once again - if you have SRIOV capable adapters, don't make SEAs. You will have worse performance. Learn what SRIOV is, Virtual Functions and VNICs are.

You don't have to trust me, you can read e.g. this guy - A first look at SRIOV vNIC adapters | chmod666 AIX blog. Benoit (the guy) is the co-author of the PowerVC redbooks and manages quite a big infrastructure.

I unfortunately can't give you information on performance tests of SR-IOV adapters, I received from another guy, who made the tests for IBM labs. I spoke to him last year, as IBM still didn't announce VNIC feature, and he convinced me, that SR-IOV performance is better, then of SEA. IBM uses the results to convince customers to buy SR-IOV adapters, but if you already bought them and paid money, use them!