Home > Articles > Operating Systems, Server > Solaris

Understanding Gigabit Ethernet Performance on Sun Fire Servers

Get an overview of the performance of the new Sun GigaSwift Ethernet MMF Adapter card on a Sun Fire server in terms of TCP/IP networking. In addition to seeing a performance picture, you will also look at the root cause of the behavior of Sun servers through the revelation of some of the implementation details of the Solaris Operating Environment (Solaris OE). A set of tuning parameters that affect TCP/IP network performance is also explored and some tuning recommendations are given.
Like this article? We recommend

Network-centric computing exercises significant pressure on the network performance of servers. With the increasing popularity of gigabit Ethernet, especially the availability of lower-cost, copper-based gigabit Ethernet adapters, the question of how Sun's servers perform in this area is one of the most important issues being addressed by Sun's engineering team.

This article presents an overview of the performance of the Sun™ GigaSwift Ethernet MMF adapters hardware on a Sun Fire™ system in terms of TCP/IP networking. Most of the previous effort on TCP/IP network performance focused on bulk transfer traffic, which imposes on servers a continuous flow of packets with sizes equal to the maximum transfer unit (MTU) of the underlying carrier. In the client-server computing environment, however, not all requests from clients nor all replies from the servers are large. Frequently, the traffic contains packets that are smaller than the MTU of the carrier. Hence, this article investigates the performance of both bulk transfer and small packet traffic on a Sun Fire 6800 server.

This article discusses the network performance of Sun servers and examines the root cause of the network behavior of Sun servers by describing some of the implementation details of the Solaris™ operating environment (Solaris OE). Also, a set of tuning parameters that affect TCP/IP network performance is discussed and some tuning recommendations are made.

Many customers are not familiar with the capability of gigabit Ethernet on the Sun Fire servers. The amount of resource to support gigabit networking on a Sun Fire server is also unknown. In addition, the best practice to tune sun servers for gigabit networking needs to be promoted.

The article presents three levels of detail. The highest level discusses the throughput numbers. The mid-level discusses the amount of resources consumed by gigabit cards and the best practice to tune some of the network parameters. The lowest level discusses the TCP protocol and explains why the system behaves in a certain way.

The audience for this article is primarily Sun resellers, Solaris administrators, and Sun service engineers. The throughput numbers and resource consumption information will help some corporate infrastructure operators (CIOs) and corporate infrastructure architects.

This article covers the following topics:

  • Overview

  • Categorizing TCP Traffic

  • Gigabit Ethernet Latency on a Sun Fire 6800 Server

  • Bulk Transfer Traffic Performance

  • Small Packet TCP Traffic Performance

  • Summary

Overview

Sun servers have been used extensively in the net economy and are powering many popular web sites. Requests from HTTP clients, database clients, mail clients, directory-query clients, and other network service clients exert great pressure on Sun servers through the attached network. The responses from the server also go out through network interfaces. This client-server model of computing depends heavily on the networking performance of the client and the server to provide optimal overall performance.

Current popular network interface cards (NICs) include the fast Ethernet (hme) and quadfast Ethernet (qfe) cards. These interfaces are only capable of sending and receiving at the 100 megabit-per-second (Mbps) range for each link, which exerts little pressure on the PCI bus bandwidth in a system. However, the newer and faster gigabit Ethernet (GBE) interface cards are gaining momentum. The adoption of GBE has been simplified because the category-5 copper cables, which many of the existing local area networks (LANs) are using, can now carry the gigabit traffic.

Since the major revolution brought by gigabit Ethernet is in throughput (measured in Mbps), this article first focuses on studying bulk transfer type of traffic on Sun Fire servers. However, even though bulk transfer traffic is a major consumer of network bandwidth, a traffic type with a different distribution of packet sizes is more commonly seen when client-server applications are run. Studies show that the sizes of the packets on the World Wide Web (WWW) are trimodal [8]. They can be about 64 bytes, about 540 bytes, or 1518 bytes (including the four-byte checksum). The maximum Ethernet frame size is 1518 bytes. Hence, restricting the network performance study only to the bulk transfer traffic is insufficient, so this article evaluates the performance of both bulk transfer and small packet traffic.

This evaluation was conducted on the Sun Fire 6800 platform using the Sun™ GigaSwift Ethernet MMF adapters hardware. The article discusses how the network throughput delivered by Sun Fire servers varies with the selected socket buffer sizes, how this throughput scales with the number of CPUs, how the packet rate changes with the application of Nagle's control flow algorithm (discussed in"Small Packet Traffic Issues,") how deferred acknowledgment works, and how long it takes to transmit and receive a packet.

The rest of the article is organized as follows: "Categorizing TCP Traffic" describes the characteristics and performance issues of bulk transfer and small packet traffic and "Gigabit Ethernet Latency on a Sun Fire 6800 Server," presents an evaluation of gigabit network latency. "Bulk Transfer Traffic Performance" and "Small Packet TCP Traffic Performance" discuss the performance of bulk transfer and small packet traffic, respectively. "Summary" concludes the article.

InformIT Promotional Mailings & Special Offers

I would like to receive exclusive offers and hear about products from InformIT and its family of brands. I can unsubscribe at any time.

Overview


Pearson Education, Inc., 221 River Street, Hoboken, New Jersey 07030, (Pearson) presents this site to provide information about products and services that can be purchased through this site.

This privacy notice provides an overview of our commitment to privacy and describes how we collect, protect, use and share personal information collected through this site. Please note that other Pearson websites and online products and services have their own separate privacy policies.

Collection and Use of Information


To conduct business and deliver products and services, Pearson collects and uses personal information in several ways in connection with this site, including:

Questions and Inquiries

For inquiries and questions, we collect the inquiry or question, together with name, contact details (email address, phone number and mailing address) and any other additional information voluntarily submitted to us through a Contact Us form or an email. We use this information to address the inquiry and respond to the question.

Online Store

For orders and purchases placed through our online store on this site, we collect order details, name, institution name and address (if applicable), email address, phone number, shipping and billing addresses, credit/debit card information, shipping options and any instructions. We use this information to complete transactions, fulfill orders, communicate with individuals placing orders or visiting the online store, and for related purposes.

Surveys

Pearson may offer opportunities to provide feedback or participate in surveys, including surveys evaluating Pearson products, services or sites. Participation is voluntary. Pearson collects information requested in the survey questions and uses the information to evaluate, support, maintain and improve products, services or sites, develop new products and services, conduct educational research and for other purposes specified in the survey.

Contests and Drawings

Occasionally, we may sponsor a contest or drawing. Participation is optional. Pearson collects name, contact information and other information specified on the entry form for the contest or drawing to conduct the contest or drawing. Pearson may collect additional personal information from the winners of a contest or drawing in order to award the prize and for tax reporting purposes, as required by law.

Newsletters

If you have elected to receive email newsletters or promotional mailings and special offers but want to unsubscribe, simply email information@informit.com.

Service Announcements

On rare occasions it is necessary to send out a strictly service related announcement. For instance, if our service is temporarily suspended for maintenance we might send users an email. Generally, users may not opt-out of these communications, though they can deactivate their account information. However, these communications are not promotional in nature.

Customer Service

We communicate with users on a regular basis to provide requested services and in regard to issues relating to their account we reply via email or phone in accordance with the users' wishes when a user submits their information through our Contact Us form.

Other Collection and Use of Information


Application and System Logs

Pearson automatically collects log data to help ensure the delivery, availability and security of this site. Log data may include technical information about how a user or visitor connected to this site, such as browser type, type of computer/device, operating system, internet service provider and IP address. We use this information for support purposes and to monitor the health of the site, identify problems, improve service, detect unauthorized access and fraudulent activity, prevent and respond to security incidents and appropriately scale computing resources.

Web Analytics

Pearson may use third party web trend analytical services, including Google Analytics, to collect visitor information, such as IP addresses, browser types, referring pages, pages visited and time spent on a particular site. While these analytical services collect and report information on an anonymous basis, they may use cookies to gather web trend information. The information gathered may enable Pearson (but not the third party web trend services) to link information with application and system log data. Pearson uses this information for system administration and to identify problems, improve service, detect unauthorized access and fraudulent activity, prevent and respond to security incidents, appropriately scale computing resources and otherwise support and deliver this site and its services.

Cookies and Related Technologies

This site uses cookies and similar technologies to personalize content, measure traffic patterns, control security, track use and access of information on this site, and provide interest-based messages and advertising. Users can manage and block the use of cookies through their browser. Disabling or blocking certain cookies may limit the functionality of this site.

Do Not Track

This site currently does not respond to Do Not Track signals.

Security


Pearson uses appropriate physical, administrative and technical security measures to protect personal information from unauthorized access, use and disclosure.

Children


This site is not directed to children under the age of 13.

Marketing


Pearson may send or direct marketing communications to users, provided that

  • Pearson will not use personal information collected or processed as a K-12 school service provider for the purpose of directed or targeted advertising.
  • Such marketing is consistent with applicable law and Pearson's legal obligations.
  • Pearson will not knowingly direct or send marketing communications to an individual who has expressed a preference not to receive marketing.
  • Where required by applicable law, express or implied consent to marketing exists and has not been withdrawn.

Pearson may provide personal information to a third party service provider on a restricted basis to provide marketing solely on behalf of Pearson or an affiliate or customer for whom Pearson is a service provider. Marketing preferences may be changed at any time.

Correcting/Updating Personal Information


If a user's personally identifiable information changes (such as your postal address or email address), we provide a way to correct or update that user's personal data provided to us. This can be done on the Account page. If a user no longer desires our service and desires to delete his or her account, please contact us at customer-service@informit.com and we will process the deletion of a user's account.

Choice/Opt-out


Users can always make an informed choice as to whether they should proceed with certain services offered by InformIT. If you choose to remove yourself from our mailing list(s) simply visit the following page and uncheck any communication you no longer want to receive: www.informit.com/u.aspx.

Sale of Personal Information


Pearson does not rent or sell personal information in exchange for any payment of money.

While Pearson does not sell personal information, as defined in Nevada law, Nevada residents may email a request for no sale of their personal information to NevadaDesignatedRequest@pearson.com.

Supplemental Privacy Statement for California Residents


California residents should read our Supplemental privacy statement for California residents in conjunction with this Privacy Notice. The Supplemental privacy statement for California residents explains Pearson's commitment to comply with California law and applies to personal information of California residents collected in connection with this site and the Services.

Sharing and Disclosure


Pearson may disclose personal information, as follows:

  • As required by law.
  • With the consent of the individual (or their parent, if the individual is a minor)
  • In response to a subpoena, court order or legal process, to the extent permitted or required by law
  • To protect the security and safety of individuals, data, assets and systems, consistent with applicable law
  • In connection the sale, joint venture or other transfer of some or all of its company or assets, subject to the provisions of this Privacy Notice
  • To investigate or address actual or suspected fraud or other illegal activities
  • To exercise its legal rights, including enforcement of the Terms of Use for this site or another contract
  • To affiliated Pearson companies and other companies and organizations who perform work for Pearson and are obligated to protect the privacy of personal information consistent with this Privacy Notice
  • To a school, organization, company or government agency, where Pearson collects or processes the personal information in a school setting or on behalf of such organization, company or government agency.

Links


This web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that we are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every web site that collects Personal Information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this web site.

Requests and Contact


Please contact us about this Privacy Notice or if you have any requests or questions relating to the privacy of your personal information.

Changes to this Privacy Notice


We may revise this Privacy Notice through an updated posting. We will identify the effective date of the revision in the posting. Often, updates are made to provide greater clarity or to comply with changes in regulatory requirements. If the updates involve material changes to the collection, protection, use or disclosure of Personal Information, Pearson will provide notice of the change through a conspicuous notice on this site or other appropriate way. Continued use of the site after the effective date of a posted revision evidences acceptance. Please contact us if you have questions or concerns about the Privacy Notice or any objection to any revisions.

Last Update: November 17, 2020