Sez "Roeland Meyer (E-mail)" <rmeyer@mhsc.com>
Actually, my testing shows a falure to utilize even 100baseTX fully. Even in a switched FDX environment (no collisions) I can't achieve line rate without bumping the packet size up. Considering that the smallest box is a quad-CPU SMP machine (550Mhz), I don't think that there is a CPU shortage <grin>.
It's a rare event to see any server get line rate on any media. If you bump up the media speed, you'll generally see more throughput. A box which can't saturate a FE link can often manage >100mbit/s on a GE link. The equivalent was true way back when FE was new.
I don't have a 10gig-E system, but I wonder about going there when I can't even get gig-E to work efficiently.
Perhaps you should talk to your server/app vendors about that.
If vendors want to sell 10gig-E they should be concerned about exactly this point.
The point is exactly the same point that FE and GE had. Initially TGE will be used as an aggregation point for lots of lower-speed user/server ports. As servers speed up to match the network's capabilities, TGE will migrate out to the servers and the network core will progress to an even faster technology (Hundred Gig E?).
Joe SOHO isn't going to buy it anyway.
Joe SOHO is generally still using 10mb hubs and isn't relevant here.
Joe Enterprise isn't going to spend the extra money unless he can see some real benefit,
That's funny, the biggest cry for TGE I hear is coming from Joe Enterprise, who is complaining that a GE network isn't fast enough to push his hundred-TByte backups and GE-connected workstations.
and Joe dot-com ain't going to do it unless it is measurably faster than gig-E (which it won't be with MTU=1500).
It will be 10x as fast, regardless of the MTU. If Joe's servers can't keep up, that doesn't change how fast TGE runs.
I can aggrigate 3-5 gig-E links to get the same troughput, by adjusting MTU, and not pay the 10gig-E meal-ticket.
If you want to go 10x as fast as GE, you will need either (a) 10 GE links with perfect loadsharing or (b) TGE. If you only care to go 5Gbit/s, that's not "the same throughput" simply because your servers can't keep up with TGE.
BTW, the selling feature on gig-E is link aggrigation, built into the spec (over Fast-E), there is no similar feature enhancement for 10gig-E, AFAICT.
To what link aggregation feature do you refer? I'm not aware of any functional difference between the aggregation capabilities of GE and FE.
Evenso, it is still limited by MTU size.
Hindered, not limited. There are devices that can fill a GE link with 64byte frames; hardware to do the same will undoubtedly appear for TGE. A 1500byte MTU is definitely a problem for server vendors, but claiming that faster media is pointless because of it is hardly realistic. Perhaps those vendors will get involved in the IEEE TGE process and get jumbo frames standardized. S | | Stephen Sprunk, K5SSS, CCIE #3723 :|: :|: Network Design Consultant, HCOE :|||: :|||: 14875 Landmark Blvd #400; Dallas, TX .:|||||||:..:|||||||:. Email: ssprunk@cisco.com