25/50G Ethernet controllers are Cloud optimised

With almost half of Cloud service providers' servers virtualised and the number of virtual machines per server expected to double to 96 by 2017, it is critical for next-gen Ethernet controllers to accelerate the increased flow processing driven by virtualisation. Broadcom's NetXtreme C-series controllers deliver bidirectional 50G throughput with 30Mpps performance and the increased flow processing that data centres need to support higher virtual machine density. Integrated flow processing with TruFlow can double network throughput and provide up to a 50% increase in application performance compared to a software-only solution.

When combined with the StrataXGS Tomahawk Ethernet Switch, the NetXtreme C-series controllers form an industry-leading 25/50G end-to-end solution for data centres that delivers connectivity in accordance with the Broadcom co-founded 25/50G Consortium and draft IEEE standard. The BCM57300 provides rapid, hardware-based, congestion notification responses that are 5,000 times faster than traditional software-based approaches. When combined with StrataXGS switches, data centres are able to avoid network congestion before it happens, enabling deterministic workload performance across the network.

"NetXtreme C-series raises the bar for Ethernet controllers and enables a cost-effective path from 10G to 25G," said Rajiv Ramaswami, Executive Vice President and General Manager, Infrastructure & Networking Group, Broadcom. "Pushing the 25/50G Ethernet specification, which Broadcom defined and co-founded as an industry standard, to the server endpoint solidifies Broadcom's end-to-end offering."

"Our Cloud data centres are growing at a rapid pace," commented Liu Tao, Senior System Architect, Baidu. "Provisioning flexibility and network performance are key factors for both bare metal and virtual cloud services. We see 25G connections to the server as a compelling upgrade cycle. It is also critical that next-gen controllers find mechanisms to scale the management of the increasingly large number of servers in our data centres."

"Our data centre customers see traffic demand continually growing, and they need efficient and cost-effective solutions to scale to that demand," said Jyeh Gan, Director, Product Management and Strategy, Data Center Solutions, Dell. "25G/50G Ethernet, coupled with advanced virtualisation support and standards-based provisioning, represents a leap forward for data centres faced with the challenges of managing rapid growth. We are pleased to see Broadcom support Open Networking with compelling 25G/50G Ethernet solutions."

"Broadcom's NetXtreme C-series of mezzanine adapters are a welcome addition to the Open Compute Project community," commented Corey Bell, CEO, Open Compute Project Foundation. "The unparalleled combination of 25/50G throughput and low power, in an open standard form factor, will facilitate the rapid adoption of 25G and 50G solutions for the Cloud data centre."

"The Broadcom NetXtreme C-series Ethernet controller, when combined with the VMware NSX network virtualisation platform, can provide an optimized infrastructure for building out a modern software-defined data centre," said Hatem Naguib, Vice President, Networking and Security, VMware. "With support for Geneve and VXLAN encapsulation offloads, the NetXtreme C-series controller further enhances the efficiency and security of overlay data centre networks. With high packet per-second processing capabilities, customers will also benefit from DPDK-based software gateways at the edge of the network that provide both flexibility and performance."

"As a result of initial large-scale cloud deployments we are forecasting that 25G/50G adapters and controllers will ramp much faster than 40G. Furthermore, as this technology sees broader market adoption, we expect that 25G/50G will continue to gain share and account for the second-largest shipment volumes, behind 10G, within four years of first shipments," commented Seamus, Research President, Crehan. "The combination of Broadcom's end-to-end solution — comprised of the NetXtreme C-series controllers with the StrataXGS Tomahawk Series data centre switches — is poised for considerable traction as these products enable data centre operators to economically and efficiently scale their networks to handle ever-increasing traffic demands."