Intel® Ethernet 800 Series

Linux Performance Tuning Guide

ID Date Version Classification
636781 07/19/2025 Public
Document Table of Contents
Document Table of Contents
Notices and Disclaimers Revision History Introduction Initial Checklist ​Baseline Performance Measurements and Tuning Methodology Performance Troubleshooting ​Tuning ice Driver Settings ​Platform Tuning (ice Non-Specific) ​Operating System Tuning ​Recommendations for Common Performance Scenarios
Notices and Disclaimers
Revision History
Introduction
Introduction ​Terminology ​Reference Documents
​Terminology
​Reference Documents
Initial Checklist
​Update Driver/Firmware Versions ​Read the ice Driver README ​Check System Hardware Capabilities ​Check Linux Kernel Version ​Check Kernel Boot Parameters ​Check System Logs for Driver Errors ​Check PCI Express (PCIe) Slot Capabilities ​Ensure DDP Package is Loading Properly
​Update Driver/Firmware Versions
​Read the ice Driver README
​Check System Hardware Capabilities
​Check Linux Kernel Version
​Check Kernel Boot Parameters
​Check System Logs for Driver Errors
​Check PCI Express (PCIe) Slot Capabilities
​Ensure DDP Package is Loading Properly
​Baseline Performance Measurements and Tuning Methodology
​General Performance Tuning Methodology ​Network Performance Benchmarks
​General Performance Tuning Methodology
​Network Performance Benchmarks
​Network Performance Benchmarks ​iperf2 ​iperf3 ​netperf ​Adapter Bonding
​iperf2
​iperf3
​netperf
​Adapter Bonding
Performance Troubleshooting
​CPU Utilization ​ice Counters ​Intel Unified Driver Statistics ​Intel PerfSpect Tool ​IOMMU in Virtualized Environments ​Resource Limitations Using E810 in 8x10G Mode
​CPU Utilization
​ice Counters
​Intel Unified Driver Statistics
​Intel PerfSpect Tool
​IOMMU in Virtualized Environments
​Resource Limitations Using E810 in 8x10G Mode
​Tuning ice Driver Settings
​IRQ Affinity ​Tx/Rx Queues ​Transmit and Receive Queue Alignment ​Transmit Scheduling Layers ​Interrupt Moderation ​Ring Size ​Flow Control ​Jumbo Frames ​Accelerated Receive Flow Steering (aRFS)
​IRQ Affinity
​Tx/Rx Queues
​Transmit and Receive Queue Alignment
​Transmit Scheduling Layers
​Interrupt Moderation
​Ring Size
​Flow Control
​Jumbo Frames
​Accelerated Receive Flow Steering (aRFS)
​Platform Tuning (ice Non-Specific)
​BIOS Settings ​Platform Power Management ​CPU Frequency Scaling Intel® Turbo Boost ​Additional Power Management Guidance Transmit(Tx) and Receive(Rx) buffer size Network Device Backlog Platform-Specific Configurations and Tuning
​BIOS Settings
​Platform Power Management
​Platform Power Management ​CPU Package C-State Control
​CPU Package C-State Control
​CPU Frequency Scaling
Intel® Turbo Boost
​Additional Power Management Guidance
Transmit(Tx) and Receive(Rx) buffer size
Network Device Backlog
Platform-Specific Configurations and Tuning
Platform-Specific Configurations and Tuning 4th Gen Intel® Xeon® Scalable Processors AMD EPYC
4th Gen Intel® Xeon® Scalable Processors
AMD EPYC
​Operating System Tuning
​Firewalls ​Application Settings ​Kernel Version ​Kernel Settings
​Firewalls
​Application Settings
​Kernel Version
​Kernel Settings
​Recommendations for Common Performance Scenarios
​IP Forwarding ​Low Latency ​Related Performance Topics
​IP Forwarding
​Low Latency
​Related Performance Topics
​DPDK ​ADQ
​DPDK
​ADQ

​Flow Control

Layer 2 flow control can impact TCP performance considerably and is disabled by default in the driver. This is the recommended setting for most workloads. A potential exception is very bursty traffic, where the bursts are not long in duration, which might result is packet drops.

  • ​​To enable flow control: ethtool -A <ethX> rx on tx on
  • ​​To disable flow control: ethtool -A <ethX> rx off tx off
Note:​You must have flow control configured on a capable link partner to successfully enable flow control on the adapter. Note:​Data Center Bridging (DCB) and Priority Flow Control (PFC) are other methods of controlling packet rates and can impact performance. However, these are outside of the scope of this document.
​Jumbo Frames