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+Linux Base Driver for 10 Gigabit Intel(R) Ethernet Network Connection
+=====================================================================
+
+March 14, 2011
+
+
+Contents
+========
+
+- In This Release
+- Identifying Your Adapter
+- Building and Installation
+- Command Line Parameters
+- Improving Performance
+- Additional Configurations
+- Known Issues/Troubleshooting
+- Support
+
+
+
+In This Release
+===============
+
+This file describes the ixgb Linux Base Driver for the 10 Gigabit Intel(R)
+Network Connection. This driver includes support for Itanium(R)2-based
+systems.
+
+For questions related to hardware requirements, refer to the documentation
+supplied with your 10 Gigabit adapter. All hardware requirements listed apply
+to use with Linux.
+
+The following features are available in this kernel:
+ - Native VLANs
+ - Channel Bonding (teaming)
+ - SNMP
+
+Channel Bonding documentation can be found in the Linux kernel source:
+/Documentation/networking/bonding.txt
+
+The driver information previously displayed in the /proc filesystem is not
+supported in this release. Alternatively, you can use ethtool (version 1.6
+or later), lspci, and iproute2 to obtain the same information.
+
+Instructions on updating ethtool can be found in the section "Additional
+Configurations" later in this document.
+
+
+Identifying Your Adapter
+========================
+
+The following Intel network adapters are compatible with the drivers in this
+release:
+
+Controller Adapter Name Physical Layer
+---------- ------------ --------------
+82597EX Intel(R) PRO/10GbE LR/SR/CX4 10G Base-LR (1310 nm optical fiber)
+ Server Adapters 10G Base-SR (850 nm optical fiber)
+ 10G Base-CX4(twin-axial copper cabling)
+
+For more information on how to identify your adapter, go to the Adapter &
+Driver ID Guide at:
+
+ http://support.intel.com/support/network/sb/CS-012904.htm
+
+
+Building and Installation
+=========================
+
+select m for "Intel(R) PRO/10GbE support" located at:
+ Location:
+ -> Device Drivers
+ -> Network device support (NETDEVICES [=y])
+ -> Ethernet (10000 Mbit) (NETDEV_10000 [=y])
+1. make modules && make modules_install
+
+2. Load the module:
+
+    modprobe ixgb <parameter>=<value>
+
+ The insmod command can be used if the full
+ path to the driver module is specified. For example:
+
+ insmod /lib/modules/<KERNEL VERSION>/kernel/drivers/net/ixgb/ixgb.ko
+
+ With 2.6 based kernels also make sure that older ixgb drivers are
+ removed from the kernel, before loading the new module:
+
+ rmmod ixgb; modprobe ixgb
+
+3. Assign an IP address to the interface by entering the following, where
+ x is the interface number:
+
+ ip addr add ethx <IP_address>
+
+4. Verify that the interface works. Enter the following, where <IP_address>
+ is the IP address for another machine on the same subnet as the interface
+ that is being tested:
+
+ ping <IP_address>
+
+
+Command Line Parameters
+=======================
+
+If the driver is built as a module, the following optional parameters are
+used by entering them on the command line with the modprobe command using
+this syntax:
+
+ modprobe ixgb [<option>=<VAL1>,<VAL2>,...]
+
+For example, with two 10GbE PCI adapters, entering:
+
+ modprobe ixgb TxDescriptors=80,128
+
+loads the ixgb driver with 80 TX resources for the first adapter and 128 TX
+resources for the second adapter.
+
+The default value for each parameter is generally the recommended setting,
+unless otherwise noted.
+
+FlowControl
+Valid Range: 0-3 (0=none, 1=Rx only, 2=Tx only, 3=Rx&Tx)
+Default: Read from the EEPROM
+ If EEPROM is not detected, default is 1
+ This parameter controls the automatic generation(Tx) and response(Rx) to
+ Ethernet PAUSE frames. There are hardware bugs associated with enabling
+ Tx flow control so beware.
+
+RxDescriptors
+Valid Range: 64-512
+Default Value: 512
+ This value is the number of receive descriptors allocated by the driver.
+ Increasing this value allows the driver to buffer more incoming packets.
+ Each descriptor is 16 bytes. A receive buffer is also allocated for
+ each descriptor and can be either 2048, 4056, 8192, or 16384 bytes,
+ depending on the MTU setting. When the MTU size is 1500 or less, the
+ receive buffer size is 2048 bytes. When the MTU is greater than 1500 the
+ receive buffer size will be either 4056, 8192, or 16384 bytes. The
+ maximum MTU size is 16114.
+
+RxIntDelay
+Valid Range: 0-65535 (0=off)
+Default Value: 72
+ This value delays the generation of receive interrupts in units of
+ 0.8192 microseconds. Receive interrupt reduction can improve CPU
+ efficiency if properly tuned for specific network traffic. Increasing
+ this value adds extra latency to frame reception and can end up
+ decreasing the throughput of TCP traffic. If the system is reporting
+ dropped receives, this value may be set too high, causing the driver to
+ run out of available receive descriptors.
+
+TxDescriptors
+Valid Range: 64-4096
+Default Value: 256
+ This value is the number of transmit descriptors allocated by the driver.
+ Increasing this value allows the driver to queue more transmits. Each
+ descriptor is 16 bytes.
+
+XsumRX
+Valid Range: 0-1
+Default Value: 1
+ A value of '1' indicates that the driver should enable IP checksum
+ offload for received packets (both UDP and TCP) to the adapter hardware.
+
+
+Improving Performance
+=====================
+
+With the 10 Gigabit server adapters, the default Linux configuration will
+very likely limit the total available throughput artificially. There is a set
+of configuration changes that, when applied together, will increase the ability
+of Linux to transmit and receive data. The following enhancements were
+originally acquired from settings published at http://www.spec.org/web99/ for
+various submitted results using Linux.
+
+NOTE: These changes are only suggestions, and serve as a starting point for
+ tuning your network performance.
+
+The changes are made in three major ways, listed in order of greatest effect:
+- Use ip link to modify the mtu (maximum transmission unit) and the txqueuelen
+ parameter.
+- Use sysctl to modify /proc parameters (essentially kernel tuning)
+- Use setpci to modify the MMRBC field in PCI-X configuration space to increase
+ transmit burst lengths on the bus.
+
+NOTE: setpci modifies the adapter's configuration registers to allow it to read
+up to 4k bytes at a time (for transmits). However, for some systems the
+behavior after modifying this register may be undefined (possibly errors of
+some kind). A power-cycle, hard reset or explicitly setting the e6 register
+back to 22 (setpci -d 8086:1a48 e6.b=22) may be required to get back to a
+stable configuration.
+
+- COPY these lines and paste them into ixgb_perf.sh:
+#!/bin/bash
+echo "configuring network performance , edit this file to change the interface
+or device ID of 10GbE card"
+# set mmrbc to 4k reads, modify only Intel 10GbE device IDs
+# replace 1a48 with appropriate 10GbE device's ID installed on the system,
+# if needed.
+setpci -d 8086:1a48 e6.b=2e
+# set the MTU (max transmission unit) - it requires your switch and clients
+# to change as well.
+# set the txqueuelen
+# your ixgb adapter should be loaded as eth1 for this to work, change if needed
+ip li set dev eth1 mtu 9000 txqueuelen 1000 up
+# call the sysctl utility to modify /proc/sys entries
+sysctl -p ./sysctl_ixgb.conf
+- END ixgb_perf.sh
+
+- COPY these lines and paste them into sysctl_ixgb.conf:
+# some of the defaults may be different for your kernel
+# call this file with sysctl -p <this file>
+# these are just suggested values that worked well to increase throughput in
+# several network benchmark tests, your mileage may vary
+
+### IPV4 specific settings
+# turn TCP timestamp support off, default 1, reduces CPU use
+net.ipv4.tcp_timestamps = 0
+# turn SACK support off, default on
+# on systems with a VERY fast bus -> memory interface this is the big gainer
+net.ipv4.tcp_sack = 0
+# set min/default/max TCP read buffer, default 4096 87380 174760
+net.ipv4.tcp_rmem = 10000000 10000000 10000000
+# set min/pressure/max TCP write buffer, default 4096 16384 131072
+net.ipv4.tcp_wmem = 10000000 10000000 10000000
+# set min/pressure/max TCP buffer space, default 31744 32256 32768
+net.ipv4.tcp_mem = 10000000 10000000 10000000
+
+### CORE settings (mostly for socket and UDP effect)
+# set maximum receive socket buffer size, default 131071
+net.core.rmem_max = 524287
+# set maximum send socket buffer size, default 131071
+net.core.wmem_max = 524287
+# set default receive socket buffer size, default 65535
+net.core.rmem_default = 524287
+# set default send socket buffer size, default 65535
+net.core.wmem_default = 524287
+# set maximum amount of option memory buffers, default 10240
+net.core.optmem_max = 524287
+# set number of unprocessed input packets before kernel starts dropping them; default 300
+net.core.netdev_max_backlog = 300000
+- END sysctl_ixgb.conf
+
+Edit the ixgb_perf.sh script if necessary to change eth1 to whatever interface
+your ixgb driver is using and/or replace '1a48' with appropriate 10GbE device's
+ID installed on the system.
+
+NOTE: Unless these scripts are added to the boot process, these changes will
+ only last only until the next system reboot.
+
+
+Resolving Slow UDP Traffic
+--------------------------
+If your server does not seem to be able to receive UDP traffic as fast as it
+can receive TCP traffic, it could be because Linux, by default, does not set
+the network stack buffers as large as they need to be to support high UDP
+transfer rates. One way to alleviate this problem is to allow more memory to
+be used by the IP stack to store incoming data.
+
+For instance, use the commands:
+ sysctl -w net.core.rmem_max=262143
+and
+ sysctl -w net.core.rmem_default=262143
+to increase the read buffer memory max and default to 262143 (256k - 1) from
+defaults of max=131071 (128k - 1) and default=65535 (64k - 1). These variables
+will increase the amount of memory used by the network stack for receives, and
+can be increased significantly more if necessary for your application.
+
+
+Additional Configurations
+=========================
+
+ Configuring the Driver on Different Distributions
+ -------------------------------------------------
+ Configuring a network driver to load properly when the system is started is
+ distribution dependent. Typically, the configuration process involves adding
+ an alias line to /etc/modprobe.conf as well as editing other system startup
+ scripts and/or configuration files. Many popular Linux distributions ship
+ with tools to make these changes for you. To learn the proper way to
+ configure a network device for your system, refer to your distribution
+ documentation. If during this process you are asked for the driver or module
+ name, the name for the Linux Base Driver for the Intel 10GbE Family of
+ Adapters is ixgb.
+
+ Viewing Link Messages
+ ---------------------
+ Link messages will not be displayed to the console if the distribution is
+ restricting system messages. In order to see network driver link messages on
+ your console, set dmesg to eight by entering the following:
+
+ dmesg -n 8
+
+ NOTE: This setting is not saved across reboots.
+
+
+ Jumbo Frames
+ ------------
+ The driver supports Jumbo Frames for all adapters. Jumbo Frames support is
+ enabled by changing the MTU to a value larger than the default of 1500.
+ The maximum value for the MTU is 16114. Use the ip command to
+ increase the MTU size. For example:
+
+ ip li set dev ethx mtu 9000
+
+ The maximum MTU setting for Jumbo Frames is 16114. This value coincides
+ with the maximum Jumbo Frames size of 16128.
+
+
+ ethtool
+ -------
+ The driver utilizes the ethtool interface for driver configuration and
+ diagnostics, as well as displaying statistical information. The ethtool
+ version 1.6 or later is required for this functionality.
+
+ The latest release of ethtool can be found from
+ http://ftp.kernel.org/pub/software/network/ethtool/
+
+ NOTE: The ethtool version 1.6 only supports a limited set of ethtool options.
+ Support for a more complete ethtool feature set can be enabled by
+ upgrading to the latest version.
+
+
+ NAPI
+ ----
+
+ NAPI (Rx polling mode) is supported in the ixgb driver. NAPI is enabled
+ or disabled based on the configuration of the kernel. see CONFIG_IXGB_NAPI
+
+ See www.cyberus.ca/~hadi/usenix-paper.tgz for more information on NAPI.
+
+
+Known Issues/Troubleshooting
+============================
+
+ NOTE: After installing the driver, if your Intel Network Connection is not
+ working, verify in the "In This Release" section of the readme that you have
+ installed the correct driver.
+
+ Intel(R) PRO/10GbE CX4 Server Adapter Cable Interoperability Issue with
+ Fujitsu XENPAK Module in SmartBits Chassis
+ ---------------------------------------------------------------------
+ Excessive CRC errors may be observed if the Intel(R) PRO/10GbE CX4
+ Server adapter is connected to a Fujitsu XENPAK CX4 module in a SmartBits
+ chassis using 15 m/24AWG cable assemblies manufactured by Fujitsu or Leoni.
+ The CRC errors may be received either by the Intel(R) PRO/10GbE CX4
+ Server adapter or the SmartBits. If this situation occurs using a different
+ cable assembly may resolve the issue.
+
+ CX4 Server Adapter Cable Interoperability Issues with HP Procurve 3400cl
+ Switch Port
+ ------------------------------------------------------------------------
+ Excessive CRC errors may be observed if the Intel(R) PRO/10GbE CX4 Server
+ adapter is connected to an HP Procurve 3400cl switch port using short cables
+ (1 m or shorter). If this situation occurs, using a longer cable may resolve
+ the issue.
+
+ Excessive CRC errors may be observed using Fujitsu 24AWG cable assemblies that
+ Are 10 m or longer or where using a Leoni 15 m/24AWG cable assembly. The CRC
+ errors may be received either by the CX4 Server adapter or at the switch. If
+ this situation occurs, using a different cable assembly may resolve the issue.
+
+
+ Jumbo Frames System Requirement
+ -------------------------------
+ Memory allocation failures have been observed on Linux systems with 64 MB
+ of RAM or less that are running Jumbo Frames. If you are using Jumbo
+ Frames, your system may require more than the advertised minimum
+ requirement of 64 MB of system memory.
+
+
+ Performance Degradation with Jumbo Frames
+ -----------------------------------------
+ Degradation in throughput performance may be observed in some Jumbo frames
+ environments. If this is observed, increasing the application's socket buffer
+ size and/or increasing the /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_*mem entry values may help.
+ See the specific application manual and /usr/src/linux*/Documentation/
+ networking/ip-sysctl.txt for more details.
+
+
+ Allocating Rx Buffers when Using Jumbo Frames
+ ---------------------------------------------
+ Allocating Rx buffers when using Jumbo Frames on 2.6.x kernels may fail if
+ the available memory is heavily fragmented. This issue may be seen with PCI-X
+ adapters or with packet split disabled. This can be reduced or eliminated
+ by changing the amount of available memory for receive buffer allocation, by
+ increasing /proc/sys/vm/min_free_kbytes.
+
+
+ Multiple Interfaces on Same Ethernet Broadcast Network
+ ------------------------------------------------------
+ Due to the default ARP behavior on Linux, it is not possible to have
+ one system on two IP networks in the same Ethernet broadcast domain
+ (non-partitioned switch) behave as expected. All Ethernet interfaces
+ will respond to IP traffic for any IP address assigned to the system.
+ This results in unbalanced receive traffic.
+
+ If you have multiple interfaces in a server, do either of the following:
+
+ - Turn on ARP filtering by entering:
+ echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/conf/all/arp_filter
+
+ - Install the interfaces in separate broadcast domains - either in
+ different switches or in a switch partitioned to VLANs.
+
+
+ UDP Stress Test Dropped Packet Issue
+ --------------------------------------
+ Under small packets UDP stress test with 10GbE driver, the Linux system
+ may drop UDP packets due to the fullness of socket buffers. You may want
+ to change the driver's Flow Control variables to the minimum value for
+ controlling packet reception.
+
+
+ Tx Hangs Possible Under Stress
+ ------------------------------
+ Under stress conditions, if TX hangs occur, turning off TSO
+ "ethtool -K eth0 tso off" may resolve the problem.
+
+
+Support
+=======
+
+For general information, go to the Intel support website at:
+
+ http://support.intel.com
+
+or the Intel Wired Networking project hosted by Sourceforge at:
+
+ http://sourceforge.net/projects/e1000
+
+If an issue is identified with the released source code on the supported
+kernel with a supported adapter, email the specific information related
+to the issue to e1000-devel@lists.sf.net