Adding 2.5Gbps Ports to XG-7100-1U

stephenw10

I mean a 2.5G NIC should work. I just don't have anything to test.

Mael

@stephenw10 - That's the ideal solution, but I'd really like to see something confirmed as working on the 7100. My wife and I both work from home and I don't have a lot of time to fiddle with this beyond dropping in the card and updating the config.

AndyRH

Would it be fair to say that if a 2.5Gb card works in a home built it should work in a 7100? There are been a few posts about people having success with 2.5Gb cards.

Mael

I realized there might be another way to get increased bandwidth from my old modem to the router. I have an Arris Surfboard SB8200 that supports LAG on it's two Ethernet interfaces.
@stephenw10 - Can I create a corresponding WAN LAG using two of the 1G ports on the 7100 and if so, how? Normally this would be easy , but the whole virtual switch thing on the 7100 can be a bit confusing.

stephenw10

@andyrh said in Adding 2.5Gbps Ports to XG-7100-1U:

Would it be fair to say that if a 2.5Gb card works in a home built it should work in a 7100?

Yes, in terms of drivers. But without actually testing it's impossible to say 100%. We had a Coreboot update to address a compatibility issue for the 4x 1G NIC we add to it. I've tried a number of random PCIe NICs in the one I have and since the update they have all worked.

@mael said in Adding 2.5Gbps Ports to XG-7100-1U:

Can I create a corresponding WAN LAG using two of the 1G ports on the 7100 and if so, how?

The switch, and therefore the Eth ports, only support a load-balance LAGG, not LACP. So maybe. To set that just add another lagg group in the switch port settings. So for ports 7 and 8:

Screenshot from 2021-11-19 00-05-00.png

Steve

stephenw10

@mael said in Adding 2.5Gbps Ports to XG-7100-1U:

That's the ideal solution, but I'd really like to see something confirmed as working on the 7100.

I tested an i225-v NIC in a 7100 running 21.05.2 and it worked fine:

[21.05.2-RELEASE][admin@7100.stevew.lan]/root: pciconf -lv igc0
igc0@pci0:2:0:0:	class=0x020000 card=0x00008086 chip=0x15f38086 rev=0x03 hdr=0x00
    vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
    device     = 'Ethernet Controller I225-V'
    class      = network
    subclass   = ethernet
[21.05.2-RELEASE][admin@7100.stevew.lan]/root: ifconfig igc0
igc0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500
	description: OPT1
	options=e120bb<RXCSUM,TXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,JUMBO_MTU,VLAN_HWCSUM,WOL_MAGIC,VLAN_HWFILTER,RXCSUM_IPV6,TXCSUM_IPV6>
	ether 68:54:5a:79:d4:78
	inet6 fe80::6a54:5aff:fe79:d478%igc0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1
	inet 192.168.232.10 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.232.255
	media: Ethernet autoselect (2500Base-T <full-duplex>)
	status: active
	nd6 options=21<PERFORMNUD,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>

It gets 2.5G even from box so I would expect that to work fine for you:

[21.05.2-RELEASE][admin@7100.stevew.lan]/root: iperf3 -c 192.168.232.1 -i 10 -P 4
Connecting to host 192.168.232.1, port 5201
[  5] local 192.168.232.10 port 61153 connected to 192.168.232.1 port 5201
[  7] local 192.168.232.10 port 58933 connected to 192.168.232.1 port 5201
[  9] local 192.168.232.10 port 39167 connected to 192.168.232.1 port 5201
[ 11] local 192.168.232.10 port 49013 connected to 192.168.232.1 port 5201
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr  Cwnd
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec   702 MBytes   589 Mbits/sec    0    160 KBytes       
[  7]   0.00-10.00  sec   700 MBytes   587 Mbits/sec    0    145 KBytes       
[  9]   0.00-10.00  sec   699 MBytes   587 Mbits/sec    0    145 KBytes       
[ 11]   0.00-10.00  sec   697 MBytes   584 Mbits/sec    0    145 KBytes       
[SUM]   0.00-10.00  sec  2.73 GBytes  2.35 Gbits/sec    0             
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec   702 MBytes   589 Mbits/sec    0             sender
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec   702 MBytes   589 Mbits/sec                  receiver
[  7]   0.00-10.00  sec   700 MBytes   587 Mbits/sec    0             sender
[  7]   0.00-10.00  sec   700 MBytes   587 Mbits/sec                  receiver
[  9]   0.00-10.00  sec   699 MBytes   587 Mbits/sec    0             sender
[  9]   0.00-10.00  sec   699 MBytes   587 Mbits/sec                  receiver
[ 11]   0.00-10.00  sec   697 MBytes   585 Mbits/sec    0             sender
[ 11]   0.00-10.00  sec   697 MBytes   584 Mbits/sec                  receiver
[SUM]   0.00-10.00  sec  2.73 GBytes  2.35 Gbits/sec    0             sender
[SUM]   0.00-10.00  sec  2.73 GBytes  2.35 Gbits/sec                  receiver

iperf Done.

Steve

ahking19

@mael Just my opinion but...If this isn't for the learning experience and your worried about downtime why bother? This is for a home/WFH network for you and your wife right? You are never going to notice or benefit from going from 1 Gbps to 2.5 Gbps. A 1 Gbps Internet service for a home network is already over provosioned, are you sure you want to pay to upgrade to a 2.5 G service?

Mael

@stephenw10 said in Adding 2.5Gbps Ports to XG-7100-1U:

I tested an i225-v NIC in a 7100 running 21.05.2 and it worked fine:

This is great news. Can you post the model number of specific card you tested? I realize all the i225-v cards should all be the same, but I've found that isn't always the case.

Mael

@ahking19 - There are plenty of times we max out our current 1Gb connection, so anything I can do to continue to bump up the bandwidth will help.

stephenw10

The card I used was (close to) the cheapest I could find on Amazon single port NIC that uses the i225-v chip. There are many to choose from all around the same price and I'm sure they all come out of the same factory in China. I'm not going to reference a particular device because I think there's every chance if I ordered it again I'd get something slightly different. Anything based on that chip should work though.

Steve

Mael

@stephenw10 I've been scouring Amazon and can't seem to find a card with an i225-v controller. I found a bunch with realtek controllers and some with i225-LM controllers, but nothing yet with i225-v. Is the i225-v equivalent to the i225-LM with the i225-v being built into motherboards? Any hints on what to search for would be appreciated.

stephenw10

I searched for 'i225v' and I note that not one uses 'Intel' in the description. Which seems suspicious! But it seems to work. You can also try '2.5GBase-T'.

AndyRH

@stephenw10 I am not saying it will work, but it has the right chips. Verify.
QNAP QXG-2G2T-I225 Dual Port 2.5GbE 4-Speed Network Card

And be so kind as to report back on the results.

Mael

@andyrh Looks like that card has the i225-LM controller. the QNAP QXG-2G1T-I225 is the single interface version with the i225-LM controller. So far I haven't found ANY NICs with an i225-v controller.

stephenw10

That's the i225-LM I believe and it was reported to have issues in the 7100 here. I've never tested it personally.

Steve

Mael

I stumbled across the XIAOLO 2.5GBase-T PCIe Network Adapter I225V Chip 2.5G on Amazon. Its been ordered and I'll give it a try and report back here.

Mael

@stephenw10 - I received the card the card yesterday and realized I needed to order a right angle PCIe x4 adapter. Is there anything specific I need to look for when picking an adaptor? Do you know what model adaptor you ship with the add-on PCI-e x4 network cards?

Mael

@stephenw10 - I called the Netgate sales team and they pointed me to the right adaptor. It's kind of hard to find in the store, but I have it on order.

Mael

I finally received the PCIe adaptor and was able to install the XIAOLO 2.5 I225V 2.5G card into the XG-7100 and move the WAN interface over to it. Everything is working great. The router sees the card and so far the connection has been solid. This upgrade, along with a new Netgear CM2050V modem with a 2.5Gb interface, has increased my download speeds from 940Mbps to 1414Mbps.

Thank You @stephenw10 for all your help!

Mael

The only odd thing I've noticed is the traffic graphs for the WAN interface no longer show up and this is what I see in the interfaces widget (I've cropped out my IP addresses.)

Here's what I see under Interfaces --> Status

And finally here's what I see from the command line (again removing my IP info)

ifconfig -vvm
igc0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500
        description: WAN
        options=e120bb<RXCSUM,TXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,JUMBO_MTU,VLAN_HWCSUM,WOL_MAGIC,VLAN_HWFILTER,RXCSUM_IPV6,TXCSUM_IPV6>
        capabilities=f53fbb<RXCSUM,TXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,JUMBO_MTU,VLAN_HWCSUM,TSO4,TSO6,LRO,WOL_UCAST,WOL_MCAST,WOL_MAGIC,VLAN_HWFILTER,VLAN_HWTSO,NETMAP,RXCSUM_IPV6,TXCSUM_IPV6>
        ether xxxxxxxxxxxxx
        inet6 xxxxxxxxxxxxxx%igc0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x1
        inet6 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx prefixlen 128
        inet xxxxxxxxxx netmask 0xfffff800 broadcast 255.255.255.255
        media: Ethernet autoselect (2500Base-T <full-duplex>)
        status: active
        supported media:
                media autoselect
                media 2500Base-T
                media 1000baseT
                media 1000baseT mediaopt full-duplex
                media 100baseTX mediaopt full-duplex
                media 100baseTX
                media 10baseT/UTP mediaopt full-duplex
                media 10baseT/UTP
        nd6 options=23<PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>

Any ideas how I can fix this, or is this just something I'll have to live with?