Mellanox Connect X-4 performance differences on Windows Server 2012 R2 vs 2016

1

We have been noticing dramatic performance degradation on Windows Server 2012 R2 when comparing side by side with Server 2016.

We see many application level packet drops on Server 2012 R2.

Windows server 2012 R2

Driver: 1.160.162160

Windows server 2016 (running older driver)

Driver: 1.33.14901.0

Performance degradation on Server 2012 appears at the application level. Here are a few more details:

We are reading high volume sequenced multicast data from vlan on interface.

At the application level we are encounter frequent gaps in sequenced packets.

The issue persists despite NIC receive buffer size raised to max the max size of 4096.

It is curious that the older driver on server 2016 performs better.

An attempt to downgrade the Mellanox driver on 2012 so something comparable to 2016 did not improve matters either.

Are there any significant config differences that we need to address when using server 2016 cs server 2012 ?

Thx

DJ

2

performance degrigradition may derive from some reasons and I would suggest you start with "optimizing the windows server/s by:

  1. lining-up & install the latest GA released Mellanox WinOF-2 driver for both Win2012r2 & win2016 and burn the latest FW on the CX-4 adapter (info can be found in www.mellanox.com web site)

  2. ensure you configure “Performance tuning & counters” on the win server/s as required by Mellanox to get optimum performance (see relevant user manual.)

  3. ensure your test is accrocc all cores, run basic NTTTcp perfromace tool with teh optuion of distributing the trafic on all cores

Browse code samples | Microsoft Docs Browse code samples | Microsoft Docs