> On Tue, Aug 08, 2006 at 06:41:14PM -0400, Mark Hahn wrote: > >> first GPUs, now NICs? http://www.bigfootnetworks.com/ appears to be >> an actual linux-based coprocessor marketed as an offload NIC for gamers. >> weird, but true! from their whitepaper, I can't tell whether their >> performance numbers are sane (2500 UDP "calls" per second sounds very >> underwhelming...) will game vendors actually write code specific > > Their white paper's little bar graph claims that its "UDP throughput > in megabytes" is "20.15", while that of an Intel Pro 1000 card is only > "11.77". They make no attempt to explain the origin of that delta.
I have no idea what this card does, but other data points are always useful: Linux kernel 2.6.14, Intel Pro 1000 desktop (32 bit/33 MHz) 1500 byte MTU, netperf gives 66 MBytes a second using a message size of 1472 (44,701 messages per second). The hardware was two 1.7 Ghz Sempron systems. BTW, netpipe TCP latency was 32 us (interrupt throttle rate off - this may not be the best setting for every code, however) -- Doug > > Assuming those numbers are in fact correctly measuring something > relevant, perhaps their card just has its network settings tuned > correctly for that test, while the Pro/1000 does not? Or the OS > networking stack on the desktop in question is lousy, which degrades > the Pro/1000 but not their card, as their card is doing OS-bypass? > > (They specify the motherboard, etc. of their test system, but don't > even mention what OS it was running. MS Windows presumably, but they > say nothing about what version.) > > I can imagine three sorts of scenarios for what this card is really > doing: > > 1. It might effectively be just a plug in key to change your Windows > network settings. In which case, well, $280 seems a little steep. > > 2. It might basically be a way to sell bundled OS-bypass networking > software for MS Windows. I suppose this might actually be cost > effective for some people. > > 3. It might actually be beter / more interesting / more useful than > any of those "Let's take advantage of naive gamers!" scenarios above. > > I wonder which is closest to the truth. #3 of course would be the > most interesting, but I don't think they've provided enough data to > even distinguish between cases 1, 2, and 3, much less understand #3. > > -- > Andrew Piskorski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > http://www.piskorski.com/ > _______________________________________________ > Beowulf mailing list, [email protected] > To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit > http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf > _______________________________________________ Beowulf mailing list, [email protected] To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf
