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Killer NIC Hands-On Testing
basscomm writes "IGN has gotten their hands on the 'Killer' NIC recently mentioned here on Slashdot and have written a two part article detailing their impressions: 'The performance boost we got out of the Killer NIC in this testing exceeds Bigfoot Networks' own claims of 10-15% gains by a long shot and certainly seems to validate the potential of the technology. We suspect, however, that the fact that these computers were marginal at running F.E.A.R. in the first place had an impact in the comparison. In many cases the non-Killer NIC machine became absolutely bogged down as particles flew and grenades exploded, enough so that the entire machine would hang for a moment as things got sorted out. Obviously this murdered average fps figures.'"
Killer NICs, hanging machines, framerates getting murdered ... oh, Jack Thompson, you were right all along!
there is no need to sign your posts. this isn't usenet. your username is right there above your post. stop it.
The article is nothing but a slashvertisement. But, if you want a _real_ NIC killer, here you go.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Yes it runs Linux...
If you did a double take at the spec's of the Killer NIC's NPU you weren't alone. It's dramatically overkill for common networking processing that the card will encounter. That doesn't mean it's useless, however. Far from it, as a matter of fact. The Killer NIC is actually running an onboard Linux build that handles all its networking duties, and, best of all, is entirely accessible to the end user via console prompt or with what Bigfoot Networks is calling Flexible Network Applications (FNA).
Now, does it run *IN* Linux? Probably not.
This is a pretty cool concept - a self-contained VM in hardware to handle your whole networking stack.
It could have potential security benefits as well, in that it would likely be impossible to use say a buffer overflow exploit in a networking protocol with this card, because the overflow would occur *inside the VM*. All that would happen is your NIC would suddenly die - not *great*, but better than having your machine compromized. The host OS could probably even detect this lockup and 'reboot' the VM on the card.
I'd just buy a gigabit-capable mobo.
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We suspect, however, that the fact that these computers were marginal at running F.E.A.R. in the first place had an impact in the comparison.
Which is why spending 300 bucks on a NIC is such a retarded move. Why not spend that money to upgrade the video card, or add more ram, or do something that's going to bring the level of the machine up a few notches?
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
The whole point of the thing is **there is no OS TCP/IP stack**.
The whole networking stack runs directly on the card. 100% of all networking load is offloaded from your main CPU onto the CPU on the card.
It is **supposed** to 'intercept incoming 'ping' requests and respond from it's TCP/IP stack immediately'.
You didn't actually bothering READING the article now did you? No that was just too tasking.
They tested one of these cards using an actual game and received a increased framerate and overall game experience vs the identical computer without the card.
I'm tired of these motherfuckin' snakes in these motherfuckin' computers!
Whoo, signature!
DesireCampbell.com
Well, the article's point is that its advantage is that it helps increase FPS due to lower CPU use. You're talking ping when they're talking FPS. Whether its worth 300 dollars for that FPS boost instead of spending 300 dollars elsewhere in the comp to improve FPS is another question, however.
What about the snake oil of being incredibly self-important without reading the article and blithely dismissing the product? Maybe this little gem, straight from the article will deflate your little bubble of self-righteousness:
Pings were relatively similar to the standard box, though we did notice latency spikes much less often on the Killer NIC'ed machine.
So yeah....you are so right. They are merely bypassing the cpu with ping requests, and somehow that is magically giving them higher fps and a smoother gameplay experience.
You know, this whole "I'm holier than thou without even reading the article" bs on slashdot is getting really tiresome(I have fallen into the same pit many times myself, I know) It really does inhibit intelligent debate about the article and just makes people feel so much more pompous(as evidenced by frequent use of such words as "snake oil") Oy....
Monstar L
Awright, color me ignorant but I'm not finding a whole lot of technical info on this so I'll ask the crowd:
How is this different than any other high-end NIC with onboard processor?
By this I am referring to the high-capacity NICs which have been made for the server market for many years by various companies. E.g. Intel has had a series of NICs for ages which have (if I recall correctly) an onboard i860 CPU, RAM etc and it's own little OS in firmware to offload the number crunching from the OS. (And a damn tiny set of drivers as well since all that code was on the board instead of the driver files).
As near as I can tell this is just like any other of these NICs only somebody slapped some pretty graphics and plastic doodads on it and tripled the price.
Or am I completely off base and this really is a quantum leap in areas other than marketing...?
Theres no way this could possibly make any difference in speed.
The test must be flawed. They should have used a seperate 3com nic or something not onboard.
Theres no way that there is a 65% performance gain becuase of the nic card. thats impossible.
I'll just use my special getting high powers one more time...
To quote the article: "Our test computers weren't fully fledged high-end gaming machines, but we don't have two identical high-end rigs, but we made do."
So what IGN is saying is that the Killer NIC performs better on a machine that is not the same as the control machine. IGN's results are entirely invalid. Heck, the little data that is presented isn't correctly formed.
My hovercraft is full of eels.
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Most people who game are plugged in behind a router, because they're sharing their internet connection. We know this decreases our ping, but what can we do? Well, if this card were itself a router, we might just have our answer! If it had a single LAN port, or maybe four (they'd fit), the gaming computer could be connected directly into the internet, with the rest of the home network behind it. Firewall and other network services could easily run from the on-card Linux. Really, it wouldn't need extra hardware apart from the ports themselves. Other software features could prioritize ping-sensitive packets like VoIP and game stuff, so that my roommate's bittorrent doesn't interfere with FEAR.
One disadvantage would be that the gaming computer would always need to be turned on for the router to do its job. Or maybe not: the card could have its own 12V plug and get its own power, so it stays on 24/7 even if the hosting computer is turned off. I expect this really could significantly improve ping numbers (vs standard NIC behind a router) plus it would be seriously cool.
Well, the result certainly is interesting, but I don't really trust their conclusion. If anything, they are showing what an onboard NIC tacked on for about $1.50 is really worth. I agree that it would be quite a bit more interesting to test the performance against a decent dedicated network card, many of which do quite a bit of offloading as it is.
It's also worthwhile to note that the card is bundled with F.E.A.R. and arguably biased towards it -- perhaps the game has code to better take advantage of the capabilities of the hardware or god forbid artifically cripple itself if not running with the hardware. It certainly wouldn't be the first time we've seen such a claim, with the PhysX drivers showing faster performance in software-only mode on very new, very fast cpu's despite a game generally refusing to run with the added physics settings without the hardware.
Sweet. ANOTHER responder who didnt bother to RTFA. Sure, your computer has a .135ms response time under ideal operating conditions. This card's advantages come into play when your computer is under heavy duress and your SOFTWARE TCP/IP stack is thus sharing the proc with an app (such as a networked game) that's pushing your CPU to 100% utilization...
The whole point is that the stack is offloaded to the card, so your network functions have minimal interaction with the CPU.
You might as well argue that a GPU is useless because your CPU can push 80FPS easily while sitting at your desktop.
As you noted, getting a better video card would be the more intelligent option.
But, the PRIMARY problem is that they're running the test on two different machines. Even if they're the same make/model/etc, it doesn't matter.
Another item is that you SCRIPT the test. You don't play the game itself.
And, finally, related to what you were saying, you get a machine that does not have trouble running the app in the first place. Upgrade the video card, get a better processor, OR RUN A LESS DEMANDING GAME!
And put a SNIFFER on the network to find out what is happening on the wire. If we're talking a hub, a card that spews packets is going to outperform a card that obeys the protocols if they're played on the same network.
This "review" reads like a crappy ad for that card. There's no real information.
...for this:
"The Killer NIC also has its own USB 2.0 port, which expands its capabilities even more. A BitTorrent client designed for the NPU could run on the card and use an external USB hard drive for storage, which would make it invisible as far as Windows is concerned. Thanks to the Killer NIC's traffic prioritization capabilities, users will conceivably be able to play the most demanding games while using extra bandwidth for BitTorrent, without any performance hits due to BitTorrent CPU load or hard drive access."
Mmm...invisible bittorrent...
I have a few wanting networks that are big enough to demand some speed but small enough not to be able to justify some of the expense. When I fist started looking into speed issues on one of them, we noticed that a simple 3com 3c905b or better nic instead of the netgear or onboard cards helped quit a lot. People don't really think something as simple as a NIC or even sound card can rob performance from an otherwise good performing computer. As a matter of fact, perceptual increases were noticed by the users. One increase was a quickbooks file that has grown to over 100 megs(at the time of the switch, it is now over 200 meg) that used to take almost 2 minutes to open over the network now opens in less then one. Windows 2000 Domain logon time decreased emensly too which is a life saver for one department were two computers are shared with over 10 different employees who only need to use it for around 10 minutes at a time 2 or 3 times a day.
At around $100 currently for a new "good network card" that is sufficient for more then surfing the interweb and checking email in the office, this card wouldn't be too off the mark for business uses. I would like to see some numbers on simple office tasks like domain logons, opening large files in an already process intensive app (quick books?). I'm not sure I would spec it out in a barand new machine but spending $300 on a NIC instead of $6-800 on a new computer might be well worth it. Currently we are upgrading P4 1.5 gig machines with around 512 megs ram because of the owners instistance on spending as little as possible on a few applications that grow large networked files quickly and already tax the computers with snappy visual pizzaz.
It makes sence that a good network card would increase the performance of game play. I've noticed it with office situations. If this has the ability to increae performance in office situations at the savings of buying new computers to battle the ever increasing bloat that seems impossible to avoid with a limited budget, I would say it is a winner.
BTW, you can usualy find used 3com 3c905b or c NICs for around $20 or so. Try one against your existing $20 NIC and i would bet you will see increased download speeds as well as better loading of larger sites on your broadband conection. I remeber at a lan party once, I was the last to start the download of a patch from a SMB share and the first to apply it because I had a good network card and my file transfer finished first. One guy was seriously pissed because he just built some outragously expensive gamming rig and tryed to claim the problem was because windows XP isn't compatible with linux file servers. Of course I just nodded and acted like he told me something new aND interesting. I didn't even bother to mention that most the games we were going to play were being hosted on a linux game server. There is more to a computer then just processor and video cards.
What a joke. Stick to reviewing games, IGN.
I'll wait for a proper review from Anand, Tom's or Ars, which will show this NIC as the snake oil that it is.
Or at the very least, Barely Legal #8.
WWJD.... for a Klondike bar?
A TOE is exactly that, a TCP Offload Engine. I tis not a replacement for a networking stack - what it does is assists in the constructoion and destruction of packets in the TCp protocol. it doe snothing for other protocols, such a UDP, ICMP, IGMP, etc.
This card is a complete top to bottom stack (as complete as Linux's stack is, since it *is* Linux's stack). The host OS's networking layer is totally bypassed and all commands are given to the card's stack. It's not really the same thing as TOE at all.