4 Steps to Choose a Proper NIC for Your Device
NIC(Network Interface Card) is a circuit board or card that is installed in a computer so that it can be connected to a network. NIC is an essential component for data communication, mainly used for LAN networks. Here are 4 tips for you if you are considering to deploy a NIC.
1. Find out what type of Network supported by the NIC.
There are various networks could be chosen for network installation nowadays, but each NIC could only be compatible with certain network types. For instance, the 10Gtek X520-DA2 supports FCoE(Fiber Channel over Ethernet) which allows Fiber Channel to use 10 Gigabit Etherner networks (or higher speeds) while preserving the Fiber Channel protocol. The other typical networks are Token Ring, FDDI network and more.
2. Get to know the transmission rate about the NIC.
You might face many options of transmission rate when you are considering a NIC, you are only supposed to choose an appropriate one for your network since the network has its own transmission rate that limited themselves to work with the NIC under certain speed rate. In the case of 10Gtek X520-DA2, it supports 10Gbps, good enough to meet the demands of High-Performance Computing(HPC), Database Clusters and Virtual Machines(VMs). Speed options like 10Mbps, 10/100Mbps, 1000Mbps, 10Gbps and 40Gbps can still be chosen for corresponding networks. The NIC with certain transmission rate should be linked to network with the exact same transmission rate.
| Bit rates | |||
| Name | Symbol | Multiple | |
| bit per second | bit/s | 1 | 1 |
| Decimal prefixes (SI) | |||
| kilobit per second | kbit/s | 10 | 1000 |
| megabit per second | Mbit/s | 10⁶ | 1000 |
| gigabit per second | Gbit/s | 10⁹ | 1000 |
| terabit per second | Tbit/s | 10 | 1000⁴ |
3. Be careful about the bus type of the NIC.
If you refer to the motherboard as a city, then the bus is the transportation of it, passengers on the bus are the bits come and go along the circuit. PCI, PCI-X, and PCI-E are the most popular bus types you could easily to get from stores, before getting a NIC, it is necessary to make sure what bus type is supported by the card.
(PCI Express)
4. Check the connector type supported by the NIC.
Please focus on the connector types like RJ45, LC, FC, SC, both of them are commonly used on NIC, and you have to pick one according to your cables. It is not that hard to tell the connector type of 10Gtek X520-DA2 because it is meant to fit with SFP+, and all the SFP+ are using LC connector, based on the standard dimension of SFP+.
(LC connector)
10Gtek is a professional manufacturer of high speed cable assembly and optical transceiver. Various of CNA/NIC of 10Gbps or 40Gbps are available to be supplied. For more information please visit www.10gtek.com or browse http://www.sfpcables.com/nic.
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