NVIDIA Mellanox MCX516A-GCAT SmartNIC Firmware 16.33.1048

Firmware which is added at the time of manufacturing, is used to run user programs on the device and can be thought of as the software that allows hardware to run. Embedded firmware is used to control the functions of various hardware devices and systems, much like a computer’s operating system (OS) controls the function of software applications. Firmware may be written into read-only memory (ROM), erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM) or flash memory. 

Important Notes:
- Security Hardening Enhancements: This release contains important reliability improvements and security hardening enhancements. Mellanox recommends upgrading your devices firmware to this release to improve the devices’ firmware security and reliability.
- When upgrading or changing the configuration on multi-host adapter cards, for the changes to take effect, PCIe restart must be simultaneously sent from both hosts (servers).
- SR-IOV - Virtual Functions (VF) per Port - The maximum Virtual Functions (VF) per port is 127.
- It is recommended to enable the “above 4G decoding” BIOS setting for features that require large amount of PCIe resources. Such features are: SR-IOV with numerous VFs, PCIe Emulated Switch, and Large BAR Requests.

Changes and New Features:

- NV Configurations via the Relevant Reset Flow: Added pci_rescan_needed field to the MFRL access register to indicate whether a PCI rescan is needed based on the NV configurations issued by the software. Note: If the Keep Link Up NV configuration is changed, phyless reset will be blocked.
- MADs: Added a new MAD of class SMP that has the attributes hierarchy_Info as defined in the IB Specification and is used to query the hierarchy information stored on the node and the physical port.
- ICM Pages: Added a new register (vhca_icm_ctrl access_reg) to enable querying and limiting the ICM pages in use.
- XRQ QP Errors Enhancements: Enhanced the XRQ QP error information provided to the user in case QP goes into an error state. In such case, QUERY_QP will provide information on the syndrome type and which side caused the error.
- NetworkPort Schema Replacement: Replaced the deprecated NetworkPort schema with Port schema in NIC RDE implementation.
- ibstat: Updated the ibstat status reported when the phy link is down. Now QUERY_VPORT_STATE.max_tx_speed of UPLINK will not be reported as 0 anymore.
- SMPs: Disabled the option to send SMPs from unauthorized hosts.
- Firmware Steering: Enabled the option to modify the ip_ecn field in the packet header in firmware steering.
- SW Steering Cache: Modified the TX or RX cache invalidation behavior. TX or RX cache invalidation now does not occur automatically but only when the software performs the sync operation using the using sync_steering command.
- Mega Allocations in Bulk Allocator Mechanism: Modified the maximum bulk size per single allocation from "log_table_size - log_num_unisizes", to allocate any range size, to remove limitations that HWS objects such as counters and modify arguments might encounter.

Bug Fixes:

- Fixed a rare case that caused the QP not to receive a completion.
- Fixed rare lanes skew issue that caused CPU to timeout in Rec.idle.
- Fixed an issue that caused the card to mask some PCIe AER reporting.
- Fixed a wrong flow of credits blockage that prevented booting during DC cycle test.
- Fixed an issue with BMC medium migration from SMBUS to PCIe, and increased FIFOs to pass large packets in case of the migration. 
- Enabled delay drop for hairpin packets. If a hairpin QP is created with delay_drop_en enabled, the feature will be enabled across all GVMIs, based on the delay drop status.

About Network Adapter Drivers:

When connected, the operating system usually installs a generic driver that helps the computer to recognize the newly attached device.

However, proper software must be applied if you want to make use of all features that the network adapter has available. This task also allows computers to properly recognize all device characteristics such as manufacturer, chipset, technology, and others.

Updating the adapter's drivers and utilities version might improve overall performance and stability, increase transfer speeds, fix different compatibility problems and several network-related errors, as well as bring various other changes.

To install this release, simply get the package, extract it if necessary, run the setup, and follow the instructions displayed on-screen. When done, don't forget to perform a system restart and reconnect the network adapter to make sure that all changes take effect properly.

Without further ado, if you intend to apply this version, click the download button and install the package. Moreover, check with our website as often as possible so that you don't miss a single new release.