IEEE 1588 Now Precision Time is a Network Utility Bruce Tolley, PhD VP Solutions, Solarflare Slide 1 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL Copyright © 2011 Solarflare Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Precision Time: Why Networks Need It • Modern networks require accurate time • Every element network has a clock • Business applications need accurate time – Network diagnostics, transactions, digital forensics, network monitoring, audit and complaince (Future) • The past: SONET/SDH networks with Stratum clocks • The future is now: Ethernet with Stratum clocks Slide 2 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL End User Application Trends • Faster securities trading systems • Low and ultra low latency switches • HPC clusters need accurate timing synchronization solution • Compliance and auditing (Future) Slide 3 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL Precision Time Options • NTP (Network Time Protocol) • GPS (Global Position System) • PTP (Precision Time Protocol) – Defined in IEEE1588 Slide 4 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL IEEE 1588 PTP v2 • IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol (PTP) • Can map directly to Ethernet or UDP IPv4 • Packet based timing distribution and synchronization • Standard Linux applications can get precsion time • Better accuracy than NTP Slide 5 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL Solarflare SFN5322F – New Precision Time Stamping Adapter Best Performance. Lowest Power. OS Bypass. Latency UDP 2.9µs TCP 3.1µs … now with precision clock synchronisation Slide 6 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL Synchronising server clocks PTP master PTP slaves • Synchronize slave clocks to a master over the network • Requires constant latency  Otherwise slaves suffer jitter  People often use a dedicated network • Requires symmetric latency  Otherwise slaves suffer constant offset from master  Speed changes cause asymmetry Slide 7 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL Solarflare SFN5322F – PTP details Server running PTPd (slave) System time Clock servo PTP master SFN5322F PTPv2 • Two stage approach 1. 2. Sync high precision adapter clock to PTP master Sync system clock to adapter clock • Advantages – – – – Higher accuracy than simple time-stamping Highly stable even if PTP packets stop Detects and discard PTP exchanges with inconsistent latency Can be used on bursty networks without special switch support Slide 8 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL Solarflare SFN5322F – Performance results 1 microsecond PTP bringing System time slave’s within system 100ns of time into PTP sync master Slide 9 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL Network load Network load Network load applied 10% line to 50% bursting removed rate (400kpps) line rate (2Mpps) Solarflare SFN5322F – PTP is ready to deploy now! • Get a precise, stable, synchronised server clock – Better than 200ns on idle networks – Better than 1µs on bursty network • Easy to deploy – Does not require a separate PTP network – Does not consume an extra PCIe slot – Works well without PTP-transparent switch support • The best low latency adapter • Kernel bypass with no application changes • Lowest latency • TCP, UDP and multicast acceleration Slide 10 | PROPRIETARY AND CONFIDENTIAL