How to choose the fastest network card for Intel chipset server adapter?
2017-02-13

There are so many different models or brands network cards on the market, so do you know which one is the fastest? Of course there is no fixed answer to this question, but all we need to know that how to choose the model which close to the fastest speed. Now we’ll list some factors that affect the transmission rate and give some Intel models for your reference.

The factors that affect the transmission rate:

There are three main factors that affect the network transmission rate: shared bandwidth, network latency and packet loss rate. 

Shared bandwidth: When multiple networked devices are simultaneously connected to the same broadband bandwidth, the bandwidth allocated to a single device cannot reach the peak value. The more there are devices, the lower the transfer rate is.

Network latency: When the amount of information is too large to restrict, a variety of data in the network medium through the network protocol (such as TCP / IP) for transmission, excessive network traffic will cause the device to respond slowly, resulting in network latency, making the transmission rate slows down.

Packet loss rate: Typically, Gigabit Ethernet traffic is greater than 200Mbps, the packet loss rate is less than five ten thousandths; Fast Ethernet traffic is greater than 60Mbps, the packet loss rate is less than one ten thousandth. I would like to use two figures to illustrate the effect of packet loss and delay on network throughput.

Packet loss rate and throughput Mbps
From the above figure we can see that the transmission of two most common applications HTTP and FTP on the network under the influence of packet loss rate, with the increase in packet loss rate of the performance of the two applications have decreased significantly. In particular, when the HTTP packet loss rate reaches 1%, HTTP transmission rate dropped to 10%.
T1 and T3 Max Throughput
The figure above shows that the T1 and T3 lines have less than 20 milliseconds latency and can be ignored, but when the latency reaches 60 milliseconds or longer, the bandwidth advantage of the T3 line is lost. And the quality of the network declines exponentially with the increasing delay.
Note: T1 = 1.544Mbps T3 = 44.736Mbps

However, except for these three factors we mentioned above, there are some other factors that affect the transmission rate as well, such as interface bottleneck, transfer protocol, network cable quality or network instability caused by different ISP etc. So you need to take so many factors into consideration when you want to choose the fastest network card.

Some models of Intel fastest network cards

Intel X540-T2
Intel X540-T2

Applicable network type:

10 Gigabit Ethernet

Transmission rate:

10000Mbps

Bus type:

PCI-E

Network interface type:

RJ-45

Intel E10G42BFSR (X520-SR2)
Intel E10G42BFSR (X520-SR2)

Applicable network type:

10 Gigabit Ethernet

Transmission rate:

10000Mbps

Bus type:

PCI-E 8x

Network interface type:

SFP+ SRLC×2

Intel X710-DA4
Intel X710-DA4

Applicable network type:

10 Gigabit Ethernet

Transmission rate:

10000Mbps

Bus type:

PCI-E 8x

Network interface type:

SFP+

Intel EXPX9501AFXSR
Intel EXPX9501AFXSR

Applicable network type:

10 Gigabit Ethernet

Transmission rate:

10000Mbps

Bus type:

PCI-E 8x

Network interface type:

LC

Intel XL710-BM2
Intel XL710-BM2

Applicable network type:

40 Gigabit Ethernet

Transmission rate:

40G/s

Bus type:

x8 (x16) PCIe* 3.0

Network interface type:

LC


Apart from the models we listed above, there are also some other models can be found on Cozlink, any questions is welcome. 
TECHNICAL SUPPORT
Get solutions or consultation from the technical team.