CNA: Overview

The Converged Network Adapter (CNA) plays a vital role in the converged data center, as it is responsible for delivering various I/Os from a number of virtual machines to and from the server it is hosted in. In addition to high performance forwarding, the CNA must also maintain traffic classification and congestion management.

To properly characterize the performance of the CNA, it is critical to use advanced converged data center test tools that can emulate virtual machines as well as the entire converged data center network.

Ixia: The only unified test platform for converged data centers

Ixia's holistic data center test solution includes multiple applications for testing next generation CNAs in a single unified test platform. The combination of Ixia's virtualization test tools and FCoE switch emulation provides a unique and accurate methodology to properly characterize the performance of a converged network adapter, without requiring a 3rd party switch which inevitably adds some amount of latency and jitter to the end-to-end performance measurement.

IxVM works with hypervisor for automatic VM discovery

IxVM ports can be deployed as complete virtual appliance or directly on bare-metal hardware to test using customized VMs and applications and specific operating environments

Ixia's IxVM product family is specifically designed to test virtualized assets and environments while leveraging trusted tools that have been used for testing hardware-based network equipment for over a decade. IxVM virtual ports provide a software-based version of a traditional Ixia hardware port that can be deployed in a virtualized environment. Virtual ports support Ixia software applications and can be combined with hardware ports to thoroughly test all aspects of the virtualized server and the impact of virtualization on broader data center performance.

Ixia's IxNetwork product family emulates of data center Bridges, FCoE switches and FCoE/FC end-stations. IxNetwork gives the user highly granular control of state machine operations, error injections, and highly customized converged traffic generation and analysis capabilities. IxNetwork supports the FC-BB-5 FIP/FCoE specification, lossless Ethernet features such as priority-based flow control (PFC) and data center Bridging exchange (DCBX), and a thorough implementation of native fibre channel from the FC-1 layer up.

Ixia's IxSAN product family provides emulation of initiators and targets. IxSAN allows the user to generate real I/Os from emulated initiators to real targets, and allows the user to emulate raw disks that can handle real I/Os from real initiators at line rate. IxSAN's emulated targets and initiators operation from the same Ixia hardware platform, allowing the user to easily and instantaneously set up hundreds of initiators or targets across dozens of ports. The user can save time and money by using IxSAN in place of dozens of powerful servers running software-based I/O generation tools. Ixia's applications help you to:

• Test functionality, conformance to standards, and performance of the CNA
• Verify robustness of the CNA when receiving erroneous conditions and negative events from the fabric
• Compare how different traffic patterns from the operating systems impact forwarding performance
• Validate lossless delivery of business critical traffic with lossless Ethernet capabilities
• Quantify CNA throughput and I/O performance