NVIDIA Mellanox MCX653105A-ECAT SmartNIC Firmware 20.28.4000

Firmware which is added at the time of manufacturing, is used to run user programs on the device and can be thought of as the software that allows hardware to run. Embedded firmware is used to control the functions of various hardware devices and systems, much like a computer’s operating system (OS) controls the function of software applications. Firmware may be written into read-only memory (ROM), erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM) or flash memory.

Important Notes:
- Security Hardening Enhancements: This release contains important reliability improvements and security hardening enhancements. Mellanox recommends upgrading your devices firmware to this release to improve the devices’ firmware security and reliability.
- When upgrading or changing configuration on multi-host adapter cards, for the changes to take effect, PCIe restart must be simultaneously send from both hosts (servers).
- SR-IOV - Virtual Functions (VF) per Port - The maximum Virtual Functions (VF) per port is 127.

Changes and New Features:

- PAM4 link performance improvement.
- Added a new counter per vPort that counts the number of packets that reached the Ethernet RQ but cannot fit into the WQE due to their large size. Additionally, we added the option to control if such packet will cause “CQE with Error” or “CQE_MOCK”.
- ignore_flow_level is now enabled by the TRUST LEVEL access registry.
- [Beta] Enabled the capability to allow Virtual Functions to send Pause Frames packets.
- Added support for the cq_overrun counter. The counter represents the number of times CQs enter an error state due to overflow that occur when the device tries to post a CQE into a full CQ buffer.

Bug Fixes:

- Fixed an issue that caused caused the device to go to dead IRISC as one of the firmware semaphores could not be released when a speed change or port state change was triggered.
- On very rare occasions, a raw BER of 10e-12 might be experienced.
- ConnectX-6 Lx does not support phyless reset.

About Network Adapter Drivers:

When connected, the operating system usually installs a generic driver that helps the computer to recognize the newly attached device.

However, proper software must be applied if you want to make use of all features that the network adapter has available. This task also allows computers to properly recognize all device characteristics such as manufacturer, chipset, technology, and others.

Updating the adapter's drivers and utilities version might improve overall performance and stability, increase transfer speeds, fix different compatibility problems and several network-related errors, as well as bring various other changes.

To install this release, simply get the package, extract it if necessary, run the setup, and follow the instructions displayed on-screen. When done, don't forget to perform a system restart and reconnect the network adapter to make sure that all changes take effect properly.

Without further ado, if you intend to apply this version, click the download button and install the package. Moreover, check with our website as often as possible so that you don't miss a single new release.

  It is highly recommended to always use the most recent driver version available.

Try to set a system restore point before installing a device driver. This will help if you installed an incorrect or mismatched driver. Problems can arise when your hardware device is too old or not supported any longer.