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Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter (CFFh) for IBM BladeCenter

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Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter (CFFh) for IBM 
BladeCenter

IBM BladeCenter at-a-glance guide

The Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter (CFFh) for IBM BladeCenter is a dual-port 10 Gb Ethernet card that 

supports 1 Gbps or 10 Gbps traffic, or up to eight virtual NIC devices. The virtual NICs are configured to 
meet the client's mix of network connectivity and throughput demands for today's complex server 
application environments. Each physical 10 Gbps port can be divided into four virtual ports with bandwidth 
allocation in 100 Mbps increments to the maximum 10 Gbps per physical port. 

Figure 1. Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter (CFFh) for IBM BladeCenter

Did you know

This adapter is based on industry-standard PCIe architecture and offers the flexibility to operate as a 

Virtual NIC Fabric Adapter or as a dual-port 10 Gb or 1 Gb Ethernet device. Because this adapter 
supports up to eight virtual NICs on a single dual-port Ethernet adapter, you see potential benefits in cost, 
power/cooling, and data center footprint by deploying less hardware. The adapter enables you to 
configure up to 12 NIC devices on a single blade server--eight virtual NICs plus the two onboard NICs 
plus two from a CIOv expansion card.

Adapter functionality can be enhanced through the future purchase of feature entitlements to enable 

FCoE and iSCSI protocol support, delivering the industry’s first Universal Converged Network Adapter 
and a future-proof connectivity solution for IBM BladeCenter.

Summary of Contents for Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter

Page 1: ...Fabric Adapter CFFh for IBM BladeCenter Did you know This adapter is based on industry standard PCIe architecture and offers the flexibility to operate as a Virtual NIC Fabric Adapter or as a dual port 10 Gb or 1 Gb Ethernet device Because this adapter supports up to eight virtual NICs on a single dual port Ethernet adapter you see potential benefits in cost power cooling and data center footprint...

Page 2: ... Fabric Adapter by Emulex and the Virtual Fabric 10Gb Switch Module from BNT This solution makes use of Converged Enhanced Ethernet CEE and can significantly help reduce complexity and cost in virtualized environments by reducing switch costs up to 75 reducing cable and adapter costs up to 50 and achieving better energy efficiency At the same time the virtual fabric solution gives clients the oppo...

Page 3: ...f 10 Gb per virtual port vNICs can also be configured to have 0 bandwidth if you must allocate the available bandwidth to fewer than eight vNICs To support vNIC mode operation the expansion card must communicate with the BNT Virtual Fabric 10Gb Switch Module which provides independent control for each vNIC In pNIC mode the expansion card can operate as a standard 10 Gbps or 1 Gbps 2 port Ethernet ...

Page 4: ...d in the IBM BladeCenter servers listed in Table 2 Table 2 Supported servers Expansion card Part number Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter CFFh 49Y4235 N N N Y N N N N N N N N Figure 2 shows where the CFFh card is installed in a BladeCenter server Figure 2 Location on the BladeCenter server planar where the CFFh card is installed ...

Page 5: ...CFFh supports in either standard physical port mode pNIC or virtual NIC vNIC mode Table 3 I O modules supported with the Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter CFFh Description Part number vNIC mode BNT Virtual Fabric 10Gb Switch Module 46C7191 N N Y N Y N N BNT 6 port 10 Gb High Speed Switch Module 39Y9267 N N N N N N N 10Gb Ethernet Pass Thru Module 46M6181 N N N N N N N Cisco Nexus 4001I Switch Module 4...

Page 6: ...ic Adapter CFFh requires that two I O modules be installed in bays 7 and 9 of the BladeCenter H and HT chassis as shown in Table 4 Table 4 Locations of I O modules required to connect to the expansion card Expansion card I O bay 7 I O bay 8 I O bay 9 I O bay 10 Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapter CFFh Supported I O module Not used Supported I O module Not used MAC addresses are assigned to the expansion...

Page 7: ... Virtual Fabric Adapter or vNIC mode Each virtual port can be configured z to operate at 100 Mbps to 10 Gbps up to a total maximum of 10 Gb per physical port The default bandwidth is 2 5 Gb per virtual port Two 1 Gb or 10 Gb Ethernet ports physical port or pNIC mode z The components used in this configuration are listed in Table 5 Table 5 Components used when connecting Emulex Virtual Fabric Adapt...

Page 8: ...D64 EM64T z SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server 11 for x86 z SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server 11 for AMD64 EM64T z Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 Server Edition z Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 Server x64 Edition z VMware ESX 3 5 z Support for operating systems is based on the combination of the expansion card and the blade server on which it is installed See the IBM ServerProven Web site for the latest information ...

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Page 10: ...onal Business Machines Corporation in the United States other countries or both These and other IBM trademarked terms may also be registered or common law trademarks in other countries A current list of IBM trademarks is available on the Web at http www ibm com legal copytrade shtml The following terms are trademarks of the International Business Machines Corporation in the United States other cou...

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