Table of Contents
Introduction
BlueField's Ethernet BlueField2 SmartNIC solutions combine Arm® processing power with advanced network offloads to accelerate a multitude of security, networking and storage applications.
Based on the BlueField BlueField2 system-on-chip (SoC) programmable network engine, BlueField BlueField2 SmartNICs integrate Mellanox ConnectX®-6 Dx network controller with Arm multicore processors and cryptology options to deliver an innovative and high-performance programmable platform. Through this article, you will be able to quickly set up a simple test lab which will allow you to experiment and explore BlueField BlueField2 SmartNIC capabilities. The setup includes a bare metal server hosting BlueField2 25GbE SmartNIC connected back-to-back to another bare metal server with ConnectX-6 Dx NIC.
License
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How to use this document
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The following diagram shows the physical configuration between the BlueField BlueField2 SmartNIC and the ConnectX-6 Dx NIC.
Pre-Installation Requirements
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2 | x86 servers running CentOS 8.2 | Intel(R) Xeon(R) Gold 5115 CPU @ 2.40GHz/ 20 cores / 2 numa / 64G memory Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2620 v3 @ 2.40GHz/ 12 cores/ 2 numa / 32G memory |
1 | ConnectX-6 Dx NIC (FW: 22.29.1016) | - |
1 | BlueField2 25GbE SmartNIC with Arm processor (FW: 24.29.1016) | ARM A72 8 cores / single numa / 16G memory/ 25G bandwidth |
1 | 25GB/s SFP28 networking cable | - |
1 | QSA28 Adapter (100GB-to-25GB Adapter)Module | - |
1 | UART-to-USB cable | For SmartNIC USB console access |
1 | Mini USB Type B cable | For SmartNIC USB Console Access |
1 | bfb image to be loaded on the BlueField BlueField2 SmartNIC Arm. | Image contains:
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- Insert ConnectX-6 Dx NIC into Server A
- Insert BlueField BlueField2 SmartNIC into Server B
- Connect the SmartNIC UART cable from SmartNIC to its hosting Server B USB port #1
- Connect Mini USB cable from SmartNIC to its hosting Server B USB port #2
- Insert QSA28 Adapter Module into Server B 100GBB 25GB port
- Connect one of the SmartNIC ports to the ConnectX-6 Dx using 25GB cable
- Connect both servers to a management LAN
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- Use automatic FM update during MLNX_OFED installation ONLY if the current BlueField BlueField2 FW version is 24.29.1016 or above. In case its older, manually burn the FW after MLNX_OFED installation.
- In case you plan to run DPDK on the host itself, install MLNX_OFED with "--dpdk --upstream-libs" flags
- The "BlueField" flag is not required in some of the MLNX_OFED versions and OS releases
OVS-DPDK
OVS-DPDK
- In R3, In R3, We've open-sourced a fork of DPDK based Open vSwitch, which supports the VXLAN decap/encap full offload: https://github.com/bytedance/ovs-dpdk, and In R4, we used the Mellanox version which is in the process of open source
- The code is fully compatible with upstream Open vSwitch, you can follow the same procedures to build them from the source. See the link: http://docs.openvswitch.org/en/latest/intro/install/
- Or you can use the ansible scripts in the Akaino Gerrit to install both BlueField2 Card and OVS-DPDK. Currently, the scripts are not available, as the scripts work by relying on many company's internal services. We are refactoring the code that you can use it in your own SmartNIC setups.
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Note
- Use an automatic FM update during MLNX_OFED installation ONLY if the current BlueField2 FW version is 24.29.1016 or above. In case its older, manually burn the FW after MLNX_OFED installation.
- In case you plan to run DPDK on the host itself, install MLNX_OFED with "--dpdk --upstream-libs" flags
- The "BlueField" flag is not required in some of the MLNX_OFED versions and OS releases
- Enable SR-IOV on FW (Optional):
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- Uncomment the following line in /etc/modprobe.d/rshim.conf to set the default RShim access method to the SmartNIC:
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options rshim backend_driver=rshim_usb
- Download and install RShim driver to communicate with BlueField2 SmartNIC, including packages required.
rpm -Uvh rshim-<version-number>.x86_64.rpm -force |
Note: before start the driver, guarantee that old version of kernel modules are unloaded if there has.
rmmod rshim_net systemctl start rshim |
- Create a
Note
- When this line is commented, the first available driver will be used.
- When the mini USB cable is not used, the driver should be rshim_pcie
- Create a file named ifcfg-tmfifo_net0 under /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ directory, with the following content:
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- ifcfg-tmfifo_net0 is the network interface used for IP communication between the x86 host and the SmartNIC with rshim _net driver.
- Enable ip forwarding and set a NAT rule to allow the SmartNIC OS to communicate with the outer world via the host management interface:
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- Reboot the server. Once the server is up again, run some configuration sanity tests:
- To verify BlueField BlueField2 FW version:
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- To verify RShim modules are loadeddriver is working:
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- To identify the backend active RShim driver:
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- Download the BlueField BlueField2 Quick Start bfb image: httpshttp://www.mellanox.box.com/s/q44f501xq1e29yb1bjpsb9vzgqs89a76downloads/BlueField/BlueField-3.5.0.11563/BlueField-3.5.0.11563_install.bfb
- Place the bfb image on the host and load it on the BlueField2 SmartNIC using the Place the bfb image on the host and load it on the BlueField SmartNIC using the following command:
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Note: CentOS based bfb is not officially supported.
Use one of the console access methods described in the "SmartNIC Management Methods" section below to follow the image installation process.
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This is not a power cycle of the SmartNIC.
How-to load BlueField SmartNIC BlueField2 SmartNIC OS image from the hosting server:
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SmartNIC Modes
BlueField BlueField2 SmartNIC can operate in two modes:
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In this mode, both the x86 hosting server and the SmartNIC Arm OS act as separated entities; Both can use and communicate with each other or the network via the ConnectX-5 6 Dx module of the SmartNIC.
EMBEDDED
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On x86 host: the output should list two network devices.should list two network devices.
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On Arm: following devices should be listed:
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2/1:
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On Arm: the output should list four representors:
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2/1:
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3/1:
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4/1:
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Issue the following commands on the Arm to see the correlation between the PCI device and its representors:
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Note
The pf0hpf / pf1hpf are the PF representors facing the x86 host.
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