Gigabit Ethernet

[Felipe Alfaro Solana]

On 10/10/06, drew at technteach.com <drew at technteach.com> wrote:
> > I'm somewhat familiar with some of the Pro/1000 models (concretely,
> > the Server models which usually pack two or four network ports on the
> > same card). What do you want to know?
>
> In my application I don't have any use for the extra ports So I'm
> comparing:
>
> Intel PRO/1000 MT Server Adapter        PWLA8490MT
> http://www.intel.com/network/connectivity/products/pro1000mt_server_adapter.htm
>
>
> Intel PRO/1000 GT Desktop Adapter       PWLA8391GT
> http://www.intel.com/network/connectivity/products/pro1000gt_desktop_adapter.htm
>
> Is the superior performance of the server adapter worth the added cost?
>
> After a first attempt at following above links and attempting to
> understand what I read:
>
>   The only difference I understood was that the server card supports
>   both 32 and 64 bit pci busses, and the desktop only supports only the
>   32 bit pci bus.

Sure! One of the difference is that the desktop version of the card is
only available for PCI buses, while the Server version is intended for
either PCI or PCI-X (beware that's not PCI Express).

AFAIK, the Server model supports Scatter-Gather, while the desktop
version does not. Scatter-Gather can improve performance under high
loads.

Basically, the Server model supports very few features that the
Desktop card doesn't. However, you should probably do pretty well with
the Desktop version unless you are planning to use Jumbo frames and
expect to have very high loads (for example, NFS traffic).