Re: NetBSD/sparc64 and GbE performance

[jnemeth%victoria.tc.ca@localhost (John Nemeth)]

On Sep 28,  5:52am, Matthias Scheler wrote:
} On Sat, May 07, 2011 at 08:42:13PM -0400, Dave McGuire wrote:
} > On 5/7/11 8:27 PM, Matthias Scheler wrote:
} > >>      Look at those pictures a bit closer.  The Cassini is a 64-bit card
} > >>and the Intel is only a 32-bit card.
} > >
} > >So? The Cassini is still bulky even compared to 64bit Intel card.
} > >And it consumes a lot of power and produces a lot of heat.
} > 
} >   It is physically larger and therefore technologically inferior?
} > 
} >   WTF?
} 
} Yes, larger chips means more transistor, inferior manufacturing or both.

     Considering the advanced functionality of it, I wouldn't be
surprised if it had more transistors.  Also, having a 64-bit data bus
means that it has at least 32 more pins.

} And it is also the number of extra chips they need. The Intel card
} contains the chip, the PHY and a little eeprom.

     Bully for it.

} >   I'm running a few of these in higher-end (V480-range) Sun machines
} > running Solaris.  While I've not benchmarked them, I know I get better
} > than 500Mbps out of them on those machines.
} 
} I never said they couldn't do 500Mb/s. But I'm reasonably certain that
} an Intel card (later updates of Solaris 10 support those for SPARC
} as well) would perform better. A friend of mine used an i82541 based

     Based on what?

} card in a SB1000 running Solaris 10 and it worked and performed
} very well.

     That's nice.  But, doesn't prove anything.

}-- End of excerpt from Matthias Scheler