Solarflare SFA6902F, User Manual, Page: 223 / 375

Issue 11 © Solarflare Communications 2014 218
Solarflare Server Adapter
User Guide
Key Adapter
Every team must have a key adapter. Figure 46 shows Adapter 1 as both the Key and the active
adapter. in a Fault-Tolerant Team.
Figure 46: Key Adapter in Fault Tolerant Team
The key adapter must be a member of a team. However, it does not need to be the active adapter.
It doesn't even need to be in the list of standby adapters but it must physically be within its host. The
Key Adapter defines the team's RSS support (see
Receive Side Scaling (RSS) on page 225 ) and
provides the MAC Address that will be used for all traffic sent and received by the team.
When a link failure occurs in the active adapter (for example the physical link is lost) the driver will
select another adapter to become active but it will not re-assign the Key Adapter. In
Figure 47 ,
Adapter 1 has failed and the team is now using Adapter 2 for all traffic.