Disappointing packets-per-second performance results on a Dell,PE R530

[Slawa Olhovchenkov]

On Tue, Jan 03, 2017 at 12:35:42PM -0400, Jordan Caraballo wrote:

> We recently tested a Dell R530 with a Chelsio T580 card, under FreeBSD 10.3, 11.0, -STABLE and -CURRENT, and Centos 7.
> 
> Based on our research, including netmap-fwd and with the routing improvements project (https://wiki.freebsd.org/ProjectsRoutingProposal), 
> we hoped for packets-per-second (pps) in the 5+ million range, or even higher.
> 
> Based on prior testing (http://marc.info/?t=140604252400002&r=1&w=2), we expected 3-4 Million to be easily obtainable.
> 
> Unfortunately, our current results top out at no more than 1.5 M (64 bytes length packets) with FreeBSD, and
> surprisingly around 3.2 M (128 bytes length packets) with Centos 7, and we are at a loss as to why.
> 
> Server Description:
> Dell PowerEdge R530 with 2 Intel(R) Xeon(R) E5­2695 CPU's, 18 cores per
> cpu. Equipped with a Chelsio T-580-CR dual port in an 8x slot.
> 
> ** Can this be a lack in support issue related to the R530's hardware? **
> 
> Any help appreciated!

What hardware configuration?
What BIOS setting?
What loader.conf/sysctl.conf setting?
What `vmstat -i`?
What `top -PHS`?
what
====
pmcstat -S CPU_CLK_UNHALTED_CORE -l 10 -O sample.out
pmcstat -R sample.out -G out.txt
pmcstat -c 0 -S CPU_CLK_UNHALTED_CORE -l 10 -O sample0.out
pmcstat -R sample0.out -G out0.txt
====