[vortex] Scyld vs kernel drivers

Bogdan Costescu bogdan.costescu@iwr.uni-heidelberg.de
Thu Dec 5 11:43:00 2002


On Thu, 5 Dec 2002, Richard Fuchs wrote:

> This is probably a frequently asked question,

Well, not an open asked FAQ at least :-)

> I was wondering about the differences between Donald Becker's driver and
> the driver that comes with the linux kernel,

The driver that comes with the kernel is based on an older version of 
Donald's driver. Both me and Andrew Morton worked sometimes on adding 
features to this driver, however the gap increased recently as neither me 
(and it seems) nor Andrew have time/interest to do it. However, the basic 
functionality is the same.

> especially the differences performance-wise.

I don't think that the driver (either of them) limits performance in any 
way when using a modern card (905B or later) with a pretty modern CPU (I 
normally test here with a 450 MHz CPU). I wasn't able to see any 
difference in transfer rate between CPUs with 400 and 1200 MHz for my 
benchmarks; the hardware maxes out at 91-92 Mbps.

-- 
Bogdan Costescu

IWR - Interdisziplinaeres Zentrum fuer Wissenschaftliches Rechnen
Universitaet Heidelberg, INF 368, D-69120 Heidelberg, GERMANY
Telephone: +49 6221 54 8869, Telefax: +49 6221 54 8868
E-mail: Bogdan.Costescu@IWR.Uni-Heidelberg.De