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marian__neagu's avatar
marian__neagu
Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus
Nov 08, 2024

Fastl4 vs for non ePVA devices

Hello,

I am trying to understand the purpose of the FastL4 VS and Fast L4 profiles. 

From the documentation:

When to use: FastL4 is limited in functionality to socket level decisions (for example, src_ip:port dst_ip:port). Thus, you can use FastL4 only when socket level information for each connection is required for the virtual server.

"The FastL4 profile is a protocol profile that you can use to manage Layer 4 (L4) traffic on the BIG-IP system. Using the FastL4 profile can increase virtual server performance and throughput for supported platforms by using the embedded Packet Velocity Acceleration (ePVA) chip to accelerate traffic."

If I have a low tier F5 device (i2000, i4000), which from what I can tell does not have ePVA chip, is there any benefit in using FastL4 virtual servers and profiles over the standard TCP ones?

 

Thanks,

Marian

  • Hello ,

    The ePVA chip is a hardware acceleration field programmable gate array (FPGA) that delivers high-performance L4 throughput by offloading traffic processing to the hardware acceleration chip. For BIG-IP platforms that contain the ePVA chip, the system makes flow acceleration decisions in software and then offloads eligible flows to the ePVA chip for acceleration. For platforms that do not contain the ePVA chip, the system performs acceleration actions in software.

    Anyway, you have still many other enhancements. Check this out:

    https://support.f5.com/csp/article/K09948701

     

    BR
    Aswin

     

  • Hello ,

    The ePVA chip is a hardware acceleration field programmable gate array (FPGA) that delivers high-performance L4 throughput by offloading traffic processing to the hardware acceleration chip. For BIG-IP platforms that contain the ePVA chip, the system makes flow acceleration decisions in software and then offloads eligible flows to the ePVA chip for acceleration. For platforms that do not contain the ePVA chip, the system performs acceleration actions in software.

    Anyway, you have still many other enhancements. Check this out:

    https://support.f5.com/csp/article/K09948701

     

    BR
    Aswin

     

    • marian__neagu's avatar
      marian__neagu
      Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus

      Hi Aswin,

      Thanks for taking the time to answer my question (which now seems very stupid)! I was reading this article, but it seems not very careful :)

      BR,

      Marian

      • Aswin_mk's avatar
        Aswin_mk
        Icon for Cumulonimbus rankCumulonimbus

        Hello marian__neagu

        No worries, if any queries in future you can raise the question again in this forum :)

         

        BR
        Aswin