Hardware Acceleration for IPv4 (pppoe, vlan, forward)
-
Hi,
I just test the Ubiquiti EdgeMax ERL3 who is using a Cavium chip supporting hardware acceleration for IPv4 et IPv6.
The benefit is when using Fiber FTTH your pppoe session is "wired speed" !Which hardware currently could support such acceleration when using pfSense ?
Does AES-NI is helping ?
Thanks in advance.
-
Short answer: None.
AES-NI will not help with IP forwarding. pfSense only runs on x86 hardware, currently, so any hardware accelerated forwarding the Cavium cpu may offer is not available. A port to run pfSense on the edge router lite is on the cards but even then I don't think you'll get anywhere near the 1Mpps claimed. I believe they are using a custom kernel module which wouldn't be available.
However there's plenty of hardware that's capable of routing at 'wirespeed' without hardware acceleration, unless you have a 100Gbps WAN. ;)
Steve
-
Steve,
Thanks for the update.
I have a fiber internet access at 1Gb/s download and 200Mb/s upload.
Is there for you an equivalent of the APU1C from PC Engine (fanless) with more power to run ?Nicolas
-
The Cavium hardware you noted on the ERL is necessary because its CPU is very slow compared to modern x86 systems. It also has some limitations in what it can actually do anywhere near stated max performance. The 7551 and C2758 appliances we offer would at least be equivalent in performance and significantly better in a number of circumstances (especially IPv6).
-
You are right and finally this is what i am looking for.
Thanks.Nicolas
-
Neither of those are fanless though if that's important for you.
Steve
-
Yes I know, but first I need power to be able to achieve my mandatory requirements… Exit APU1C or EdgeMax ERL3 !
