Physical Testbeds

All FD.io CSIT performance testing listed in this report are executed on physical testbeds built with bare-metal servers hosted by LF FD.io project. Two testbed topologies are used:

  • 3-Node Topology: Consisting of two servers acting as SUTs (Systems Under Test) and one server as TG (Traffic Generator), all connected in ring topology. Used for executing all of the data plane tests including overlay tunnels and IPSec tests.
  • 2-Node Topology: Consisting of one server acting as SUTs (Systems Under Test) and one server as TG (Traffic Generator), both connected in ring topology. Used for execution of tests without any overlay tunnel encapsulations. Added in CSIT rls18.07.

Current FD.io production testbeds are built with servers based on two processor generations of Intel Xeons: Haswell-SP (E5-2699v3) and Skylake (Platinum 8180). Testbeds built with servers based on Arm processors are in the process of being added to FD.io production.

Server SUT and DUT performance depends on server and processor type, hence results for testbeds based on different servers must be reported separately, and compared if appropriate.

Complete technical specifications of compute servers used in CSIT physical testbeds are maintained in FD.io CSIT repository: FD.io CSIT testbeds - Xeon Skylake, Arm, Atom and FD.io CSIT Testbeds - Xeon Haswell.

Following sections describe existing production testbed types.

3-Node Xeon Haswell (3n-hsw)

3n-hsw testbed is based on three Cisco UCS-c240m3 servers each equipped with two Intel Xeon Haswell-SP E5-2699v3 2.3 GHz 18 core processors. Physical testbed topology is depicted in a figure below.

testbed-3n-hsw

SUT1 and SUT2 servers are populated with the following NIC models:

  1. NIC-1: VIC 1385 2p40GE Cisco.
  2. NIC-2: NIC x520 2p10GE Intel.
  3. NIC-3: empty.
  4. NIC-4: NIC xl710-QDA2 2p40GE Intel.
  5. NIC-5: NIC x710-DA2 2p10GE Intel.
  6. NIC-6: QAT 8950 50G (Walnut Hill) Intel.

TG servers run T-Rex application and are populated with the following NIC models:

  1. NIC-1: NIC xl710-QDA2 2p40GE Intel.
  2. NIC-2: NIC x710-DA2 2p10GE Intel.
  3. NIC-3: empty.
  4. NIC-4: NIC xl710-QDA2 2p40GE Intel.
  5. NIC-5: NIC x710-DA2 2p10GE Intel.
  6. NIC-6: NIC x710-DA2 2p10GE Intel. (For self-tests.)

All Intel Xeon Haswell servers run with Intel Hyper-Threading disabled, making the number of logical cores exposed to Linux match the number of 18 physical cores per processor socket.

Total of three 3n-hsw testbeds are in operation in FD.io labs.

3-Node Xeon Skylake (3n-skx)

3n-skx testbed is based on three SuperMicro SYS-7049GP-TRT servers each equipped with two Intel Xeon Skylake Platinum 8180 2.5 GHz 28 core processors. Physical testbed topology is depicted in a figure below.

testbed-3n-skx

SUT1 and SUT2 servers are populated with the following NIC models:

  1. NIC-1: x710-DA4 4p10GE Intel.
  2. NIC-2: xxv710-DA2 2p25GE Intel.
  3. NIC-3: empty, future expansion.
  4. NIC-4: empty, future expansion.
  5. NIC-5: empty, future expansion.
  6. NIC-6: empty, future expansion.

TG servers run T-Rex application and are populated with the following NIC models:

  1. NIC-1: x710-DA4 4p10GE Intel.
  2. NIC-2: xxv710-DA2 2p25GE Intel.
  3. NIC-3: empty, future expansion.
  4. NIC-4: empty, future expansion.
  5. NIC-5: empty, future expansion.
  6. NIC-6: x710-DA4 4p10GE Intel. (For self-tests.)

All Intel Xeon Skylake servers run with Intel Hyper-Threading enabled, doubling the number of logical cores exposed to Linux, with 56 logical cores and 28 physical cores per processor socket.

Total of two 3n-skx testbeds are in operation in FD.io labs.

2-Node Xeon Skylake (2n-skx)

2n-skx testbed is based on two SuperMicro SYS-7049GP-TRT servers each equipped with two Intel Xeon Skylake Platinum 8180 2.5 GHz 28 core processors. Physical testbed topology is depicted in a figure below.

testbed-2n-skx

SUT servers are populated with the following NIC models:

  1. NIC-1: x710-DA4 4p10GE Intel.
  2. NIC-2: xxv710-DA2 2p25GE Intel.
  3. NIC-3: mcx556a-edat ConnectX5 2p100GE Mellanox. (Not used yet.)
  4. NIC-4: empty, future expansion.
  5. NIC-5: empty, future expansion.
  6. NIC-6: empty, future expansion.

TG servers run T-Rex application and are populated with the following NIC models:

  1. NIC-1: x710-DA4 4p10GE Intel.
  2. NIC-2: xxv710-DA2 2p25GE Intel.
  3. NIC-3: mcx556a-edat ConnectX5 2p100GE Mellanox. (Not used yet.)
  4. NIC-4: empty, future expansion.
  5. NIC-5: empty, future expansion.
  6. NIC-6: x710-DA4 4p10GE Intel. (For self-tests.)

All Intel Xeon Skylake servers run with Intel Hyper-Threading enabled, doubling the number of logical cores exposed to Linux, with 56 logical cores and 28 physical cores per processor socket.

Total of four 2n-skx testbeds are in operation in FD.io labs.

2-Node Atom Denverton (2n-dnv)

2n-dnv testbed is based on one Intel Server Board S2600WFT that is equipped with two Intel Atom CPU C3858 @ 2.00GHz 12 core processors and one SuperMicro SYS-E300-9A server that is equipped with one SuperMicro A2SDi-TP8F motherboard. Physical testbed topology is depicted in a figure below.

testbed-2n-dnv

SUT server have four internal 10G NIC port:

  1. P-1: x553 copper port.
  2. P-2: x553 copper port.
  3. P-3: x553 fiber port.
  4. P-4: x553 fiber port.

TG server run T-Rex software traffic generator and are populated with the following NIC models:

  1. NIC-1: x550-T2 2p10GE Intel.
  2. NIC-2: x550-T2 2p10GE Intel.
  3. NIC-3: x520-DA2 2p10GE Intel.
  4. NIC-4: x520-DA2 2p10GE Intel.

The 2n-dnv testbed is in operation in Intel SH labs.