NVIDIA Mellanox MCX516A-GCAT SmartNIC Firmware 16.34.1002

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:
- 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.
- Security Hardening Enhancements: This release contains important reliability improvements and security hardening enhancements. NVIDIA 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). To do so, perform the following: 1. Shut down the server with the auxiliary card. 2. Shut down the server with the primary card. 3. Bring back the server with the primary card. 4. Bring back the server with the auxiliary card.

Changes and New Features:

- Added LLDPEnable, LLDPTransmit and LLDPReceive properties to the RDE Port schema implementation.

Bug Fixes:

- Fixed an issue where set_flow_table_entry failed when aso_flow_meter action was used. 
- Added "Command Unsupported" response code in cases when running the MCTP control command "Get Vendor Defined Messages Supported", and there were no supported VDMs.
- Fixed a race condition occured between the duplicate read and QP commands (2RST, 2ERR and Destroy) in the signature that caused the command to hang.
- When all traffic applications sharing the same combination of <function, priority, side> are rate limited (for example by congestion control), this limit is enforced on other applications with different combinations of <function, priority, side> under the same VL. For example, requestor flows (RDMA-write) are limited to rate X, however, this rate is also enforced on a QP sending RDMA-read responses. This firmware version prevents rate limit enforcement on traffic applications which should not be limited.

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.