82599 with Enhanced Network Stack

[akhmarov]

Hello

We have strange issue with Enhanced Network Stack (ENS) on 82599 based card

The card is Fujitsu Eth Ctrl 2x10Gbit PCIe D2755 SFP+ [S26361-F3629-L502]

According to Broadcom's HCL it should support ENS with ixgben_ens driver version 1.7.1.0

https://compatibilityguide.broadcom.com/detail?program=io&productId=19666&persona=live&column=brandName&order=asc&vid=8086&did=10fb&svid=1734&maxSsid=11a9&productReleaseVersion=%5BESXi+7.0+U3%5D&activePage=1&activeDelta=20&redirectFrom=Eth%20Ctrl%202x10Gbit%20PCIe%20%20D2755%20SFP+

The config

[root@esxi:~] vmware -v
VMware ESXi 7.0.3 build-24585291
[root@esxi:~] esxcfg-nics -e
Name    Driver      ENS Capable   ENS Driven    INTR Capable  INTR Enabled  MAC Address       Description                   
vmnic0  ixgben      True          False         False         False         90:1b:0e:eb:7f:1f Intel(R) 82599 10 Gigabit Dual Port Network Connection
vmnic1  ixgben      True          False         False         False         90:1b:0e:eb:7f:20 Intel(R) 82599 10 Gigabit Dual Port Network Connection
[root@esxi:~] vmkload_mod -s ixgben_ens
vmkload_mod module information
 input file: /usr/lib/vmware/vmkmod/ixgben_ens
 Version: 1.7.1.0-1OEM.700.1.0.15843807
 Build Type: release
 License: Intel
 Required name-spaces:
  com.vmware.vmkapi#v2_6_0_0
 Parameters:

The issue

[root@esxi:~] zcat /var/log/boot.gz | grep ixgben_ens
2025-04-07T13:56:40.390Z cpu7:2097838)Loading module ixgben_ens ...
2025-04-07T13:56:40.391Z cpu7:2097838)Elf: 2119: module ixgben_ens has license ThirdParty
2025-04-07T13:56:40.396Z cpu7:2097838)ixgben_ens needs maximum 147456 bytes for shared heap
2025-04-07T13:56:40.396Z cpu7:2097838)Device: 211: Registered driver 'ixgben_ens' from 52
2025-04-07T13:56:40.396Z cpu7:2097838)Mod: 4821: Initialization of ixgben_ens succeeded with module ID 52.
2025-04-07T13:56:40.396Z cpu7:2097838)ixgben_ens loaded successfully.
2025-04-07T13:56:40.401Z cpu7:2097838)ixgben_ens: indrv_Attach:2241: Attaching ixgben_ens driver
2025-04-07T13:56:40.401Z cpu7:2097838)WARNING: ixgben_ens: indrv_Attach:2349: Device is not ENS uplink
2025-04-07T13:56:40.405Z cpu7:2097838)ixgben_ens: indrv_Attach:2241: Attaching ixgben_ens driver
2025-04-07T13:56:40.405Z cpu7:2097838)WARNING: ixgben_ens: indrv_Attach:2349: Device is not ENS uplink

So the driver could not initialize ENS:

WARNING: ixgben_ens: indrv_Attach:2349: Device is not ENS uplink

Maybe there are special requirements like: disable SR-IOV in BIOS or something else to successfully enable ENS for 82599?

[akhmarov · Accepted solution]

Seems I found the answer to my question:

Broadcom HCL says that 82599 card supports Enhanced Data Path - Poll Mode only. And ENS in general is a EDP Standard which requires Enhanced Data Path - Interrupt Mode feature. No ENS for 82599 cards