By Todd Owens, Technical Marketing Manager, Marvell
Hewlett Packard
Enterprise (HPE) recently updated its product naming protocol for the Ethernet
adapters in its HPE ProLiant and HPE Apollo servers. Its new approach is to
include the ASIC model vendor’s name in the HPE adapter’s product name. This
commonsense approach eliminates the need for model number decoder rings on the
part of Channel Partners and the HPE Field team and provides everyone with more
visibility and clarity. This change also aligns more with the approach HPE has
been taking with their “Open” adapters on HPE ProLiant Gen10 Plus servers. All
of this is good news for everyone in the server sales ecosystem, including the
end user. The products’ core SKU numbers remain the same, too, which is also
good.
For HPE Ethernet adapters for HPE ProLiant Gen10 Plus and
HPE Apollo Gen10 Plus servers, the name changes were fairly basic. Under this
new naming protocol, HPE moved the name of the adapter’s manufacturer to the front
and added “for HPE” to the end. For example, what was previously named “HPE
Ethernet 10/25Gb 2-port SFP28 QL41232HLCU Adapter” is now “Marvell QL41232HLCU
Ethernet 10/25Gb 2-port SFP28 Adapter for HPE”. The model number, QL41232HLCU,
did not change.
The table below shows the new naming for the HPE adapters
using Marvell FastLinQ I/O technology and makes it very easy to match up ASIC
technology, connection type and form factor across the different products.
Inevitably, there are a few challenges with the new approach,
especially for the adapters used in Gen10 servers. The first is that the
firmware in the adapters is not changing. So, when a customer boots up the
server, the old model information, such as 524SFP+, will be displayed on the
system management screens. The same applies to information passed from the
adapter to other management software, such as HPE
Network Orchestrator. However, in HPE’s configuration tools – One Config
Advanced (OCA) – only the new names and model numbers appear, with no mention
of the original numbers. This could create confusion when you’re configuring a
system and it boots up, displaying a different model number than the one you
are actually using.
Additionally, it is going to take some time for operating
system vendors like VMware and Microsoft to update their hardware compatibility
listings. Today, you can go to the VMware Compatibility Guide (VCG) and search
on a 621SFP28 with no problem. But search on a QL41401 or QL41401-A2G, and you
will come up empty. HPE is also working on updating its QuickSpec documents
with the new naming, and that will take some time as well.
So, while the model number decoder rings are no longer required,
you will need to have easy to access cross references to match the new name to
the old model. To support you on this, we have updated all our key collateral for
HPE-specific Marvell® FastLinQ® Ethernet adapters on the Marvell HPE Microsite. These documents
were updated to include not only the new product names that HPE has
implemented, but the original model number references as well.
Why Marvell FastLinQ for HPE? First, we are a strategic
supplier to HPE for I/O technology. In fact, HPE Synergy I/O is based on
Marvell FastLinQ technology. Value-add features like storage offload for iSCSI
and FCoE and network partitioning are key to enabling HPE to deliver composable
network connectivity on their flagship blade solutions.
In addition to storage offload, Marvell provides HPE with
unique features such as Universal RDMA and SmartAN® technology. Universal RDMA
provides the HPE customer with the ability to run either RoCE RDMA or iWARP
RDMA protocols on a single adapter. So, as their needs for implementing RDMA
protocols change, there is no need to change adapters. SmartAN technology automatically
configures the adapter ports for the proper 10GbE or 25GbE bandwidth, and –
based on the type of switch the adapter is connected to and the physical
cabling connection – adjusts the forward error correction settings. FastLinQ
adapters also support a variety of other offloads including SR-IOV, DPDK and
tunneling. This minimizes the impact I/O traffic management has on the host
CPU, freeing up CPU resources to do more important work.
Our team of I/O experts stands ready to help you differentiate
your solutions based on industry leading I/O technology and features for HPE
servers. If you need help selecting the right I/O technology for your HPE
customer, contact our field sales and application engineering experts using the
Contacts link
on our Marvell HPE Microsite.
