Looking at the current driver selection across different OS/cards/medium (IB vs. ETH) it looks like the only space consistently supported by Mellanox is Linux. Indeed, for Linux you have everything:
- every card is supported (all the way from Connect-X2 to Connect-X5)
- IB and ETH and the possibility to switch from one to another for the cards that support it (VPI), and you can even use IB on one port and ETH on another
- iSER initiator is supported across the board and iSER target is supported with both LIO and SCST
- SRP initiator is supported across the board and SRP target is supported with SCST
So, if you use KVM as your hyperwisor , there is no problem.
However, if you want to use Mellanox IB technology in conjunction with currently the most popular hyperwisor (VMware ESXi), you're in trouble:
- there is no official support for ESXi 5.5 and up for any card older than Connect-X3
- the only VPI cards supported in IB mode are Connect-X3/Pro
- Connect-IB cards are not supported at all
- Connect-X4 cards are supported only in ETH mode
- dual-port VPI cards support only the same protocol (IB or ETH) on both ports, not a mix
- SRP initiator is no longer available
- iSER initiator is available only with 1.9.x.x drivers only over ETH and only for Connect-X3/Pro cards
- the current IB driver 2.3.x.x is compatible only with ESXi 5.5 (not 6.0!), works only with Connect-X3/Pro cards and includes neither SRP nor iSER initiator
My question is very simple: what's the long term strategy of Mellanox with regards to hyperwisor support? Are they suggesting that everyone considering Mellanox products should switch to KVM as their hyperwisor of choice? Or they should abandon RDMA and use Mellanox adapters/switches only as 56/100Gbe network infrastructure?
I would REALLY appreciate some reaction from Mellanox staff, who no doubt have already seen this thread, but, for some reason, chose not to react to it...