WARNING
Any SBC SWe configuration (other than/outside of a D-SBC deployment) beyond 32 vCPUs is invalid and not supported.
In this section:
Caution
The recommended hardware and software settings are intended to ensure optimum SBC SWe stability and performance. If the recommended settings are not used, the SBC SWe system may not behave as expected.
To install and configure SBC SWe, make sure the Virtual Machine (VM) host meets the following recommended hardware, server platform and software requirements.
SBC SWe for KVM Hypervisor – Server Hardware Requirements
Note
Ribbon is retiring the 2 vCPU for the SBC SWe private cloud as of the 12.0 release.
The following table lists the server hardware requirements. Intel Xeon processors (Nehalem micro-architecture or above) with 6 cores and above (processors should support hyper threading). Ribbon recommends using Westmere (or newer) processors for better SRTP performance. These processors have the AES-NI instruction set for performing cryptographic operations in hardware. The supported CPU Family number is 6 and CPU Model number must be newer than 26. Refer to the Intel Architecture and Processor Identification document for more information. Minimum 4 NICs Use the latest firmware for the specific NIC corresponding to the hardware platform. The following are supported for configuring as SR_IOV: Make sure NICs have multi-queue support which enhances network performance by allowing RX and TX queues to scale with the number of CPUs on multi-processor systems. The SBC SWe on KVM Hypervisor is qualified to support the Marvell QLogic QL45604 NIC (SR-IOV) for release 10.01.03R0. For this release, QLogic QL45604 NICs (SR-IOV) is not qualified on the SBC CNe or other SBC SWe platforms. Ribbon highly recommends the following before using the QLogic QL45604 NIC: Number of ports allowed: The SBC SWe software runs only on platforms using Intel processors. Platforms using AMD processors are not supported.Configuration Requirement Processor
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RAM Minimum 24 GB Hard Disk Minimum 500 GB Network Interface Cards (NICs)
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Ports
Warning
BIOS Setting Recommendations
Ribbon recommends the following BIOS settings for optimum performance:
| BIOS Parameter | Recommended Setting | Details |
|---|---|---|
| Intel VT-x (Virtualization Technology) | Enabled | For hardware virtualization |
| Intel Hyper-Threading | Enabled | |
| Intel Turbo Boost | Enabled | |
| CPU Power Management | Maximum Performance | |
| Sub-NUMA Clustering | Disabled | Only applies if it is present as an option on the server |
Example BIOS setting recommendations for HP DL380p Gen8 servers are shown below. For BIOS settings of other servers, refer to the respective vendor's website.
BIOS Setting Recommendations for HP DL380p Gen8 Servers
| BIOS Parameter | Recommended Setting | Default Value |
|---|---|---|
| HP Power Profile | Maximum Performance | Balanced Power and Performance |
| Thermal Configuration | Maximum Cooling | Optimal Cooling |
| HW Prefetchers | Disabled | Enabled |
| Adjacent Sector Prefetcher | Disabled | Enabled |
| Processor Power and Utilization Monitoring | Disabled | Enabled |
| Memory Pre-Failure Notification | Disabled | Enabled |
| Memory Refresh Rate | 1x Refresh | 2x Refresh |
SBC SWe for KVM Hypervisor – Software Requirements
The minimum SBC SWe requirements for a KVM hypervisor environment are listed in the following table.Software Version Tested or Qualified Version KVM Module 3.10.0 or above 3.10.0 QEMU Emulator 1.5.3 1.5.3 libvirtd (libvirt) 1.1.1 1.1.1 virt-manager 0.10.0 0.10.0
Downloading the SBC SWe Software Package
For more information, see Downloading the SBC SWe Software Package.
Note
Ensure Processors and VM configuration (CPUs, RAM, Virtual Hard Disk, NICs, and Bridge settings) are identical for an SBC SWe HA pair.
Note
Do not change BIOS settings once they are applied on the server.
KVM Configuration and Settings
| Configuration | Settings |
|---|---|
| vCPU | Minimum 4 vCPUs required. Any number of vCPUs may be configured depending upon the call capacity requirements, but the number should be even (4, 6, 8, etc.) to avoid impacting performance. CPU resource reservation and pinning are required. |
| vRAM | Reserve the memory based on call capacity and configuration requirements. Refer to benchmarking data for supported call capacities with different configuration limits. Memory resource reservation is required. |
| Virtual Hard Disk | Set Hard Disk (virtual) size as 100 GB or more (based on requirements of retaining CDRs, logs, etc. for number of days). Note: Hard disk size cannot be changed after the SBC SWe software is installed. |
| vNICs | Set number of virtual NICs as 4 (1-MGMT, 1-HA, 1-PKT0 and 1-PKT1).
Note
To configure VLAN on SRIOV and PCI Passthrough Ethernet interfaces, disable the Data Center Bridging (DCB) on the switch connected to the interfaces. |
Note
You can instantiate the SBC SWe in smaller-sized configurations that use limited memory and vCPU resources, if required. However, the limited resources place some restrictions on capacity and capabilities. Refer to Small SBC SWe Deployment Characteristics and Small SBC SWe Configuration Performance Metrics for more information.
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