[Beowulf] Mellanox UFM question

[Jörg Saßmannshausen]

Hi Jeff,

no, not yet. 
What I want to avoid is: I try the OFED subnet manager and it does not work 
and then I have to wait until I get the licence. This project has enough 
delays right now and I don't want to add to it. Hence my question.

Having said that: are you happy with the OFED one?

All the best

Jörg

On Dienstag 15 September 2015 Jeff Becker wrote:
> Hi Jörg,
> 
> Have you tried using the subnet manager from Mellanox OFED (which is
> free)? That's what we use on our big heterogeneous cluster at NASA.
> 
> HTH
> 
> -jeff
> 
> On 09/15/2015 08:55 AM, Jörg Saßmannshausen wrote:
> > Dear all,
> > 
> > I am a bit confused and I was wondering whether somebody on the list
> > could give me a bit of advice here.
> > 
> > I was previously using QLogic for my QDR InfiniBand network. I got one
> > master switch which got the licence for the InfiniBand installed and
> > things appear to work ok. At least I cannot detect any problems despite
> > adding switches and nodes to the fabric.
> > 
> > Now, we recently purchased a new cluster with 20 cores per node and here
> > I decided to go for FDR to be a bit more future proofed as well. So I
> > got the 'normal' licence from Mellanox for the cluster. I got one
> > licence per node so I assumed that was ok.
> > 
> > Now, we are in the process to set up another cluster with a mixture of
> > older and newer hardware. Again I have decided to opt for the FDR simply
> > to be a bit more future proofed. And this is where the confusion comes
> > in.
> > 
> > Apparently I do need now the UFM (Unified Fibre Manager) from Mellanox to
> > run the InfiniBand. However, the normal licence is only for up to 16
> > cores per node and I would need the more expensive exhanced licence.
> > 
> >  From what I and a colleague of mine can see the UFM is nothing more than
> >  the
> > 
> > requires subnet manager plus some diagnostic tools.
> > 
> > There are two questions here:
> > 
> > - do we really need the exhanced UFM licence or is that just a way to
> > make money?
> > 
> > - would the open source subnet manage work as well and would the open
> > source diagnostic tools be ok?
> > 
> > - why do I need to pay for a licence for each node? Somehow I cannot
> > recall having done that in the past.
> > 
> > Unfortunately, InfiniBand is not my strong side and thus I would
> > appreciate and advice here.
> > 
> > All the best from a meanwhile sunny London
> > 
> > Jörg
> > 
> > 
> > 
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-- 
*************************************************************
Dr. Jörg Saßmannshausen, MRSC
University College London
Department of Chemistry
20 Gordon Street
London
WC1H 0AJ 

email: j.sassmannshausen at ucl.ac.uk
web: http://sassy.formativ.net

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