I was not able to find the answer online for the following question: does ESXi supports Cisco VIC 1225 NIC in SR-IOV mode?
The NIC itself supports SR-IOV, I used it in SR-IOV mode under RHEL. But ESXi (5.5 and 6.5) show "SR-IOV not supported".
How can I use Cisco VIC 1225 with SR-IOV under ESXi?
Tried to update / use the latest enic / nenic drivers – no luck.
ESXi 6.5:
esxcli software vib list | grep -i nenic
nenic 1.0.1.0-1OEM.650.0.0.4598673 Cisco VMwareCertified 2017-04-25
esxcli network nic list
Name PCI Device Driver Admin Status Link Status Speed Duplex MAC Address MTU Description
------- ------------ ------ ------------ ----------- ----- ------ ----------------- ---- ---------------------------------------------------------
vmnic1 0000:58:00.0 ixgbe Up Down 0 Half e8:65:49:9f:32:54 1500 Intel Corporation Ethernet Controller 10 Gigabit X540-AT2
vmnic12 0000:48:00.0 nenic Up Up 10000 Full e8:65:49:54:8a:41 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC Ethernet NIC
vmnic13 0000:49:00.0 nenic Up Down 0 Half e8:65:49:54:8a:42 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC Ethernet NIC
vmnic14 0000:51:00.0 nenic Up Up 10000 Full e8:65:49:54:72:98 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC Ethernet NIC
vmnic15 0000:52:00.0 nenic Up Down 0 Half e8:65:49:54:72:99 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC Ethernet NIC
...
vmnic24 0000:88:00.0 nenic Up Up 10000 Full e8:65:49:54:72:78 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC EthernetNIC
vmnic25 0000:89:00.0 nenic Up Down 0 Half e8:65:49:54:72:79 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC Ethernet NIC
vmnic26 0000:cc:00.0 nenic Up Up 10000 Full e8:65:49:54:ab:6e 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC Ethernet NIC
vmnic27 0000:cd:00.0 nenic Up Down 0 Half e8:65:49:54:ab:6f 1500 Cisco Systems Inc Cisco VIC Ethernet NIC
...
esxcli network sriovnic list
Name PCI Device Driver Link Speed Duplex MAC Address MTU Description
------ ------------ ------ ---- ----- ------ ----------------- ---- ---------------------------------------------------------
vmnic1 0000:58:00.0 ixgbe Down 0 Half e8:65:49:9f:32:54 1500 Intel Corporation Ethernet Controller 10 Gigabit X540-AT2
vmnic2 0000:58:00.1 ixgbe Down 0 Half e8:65:49:9f:32:56 1500 Intel Corporation Ethernet Controller 10 Gigabit X540-AT2
Here is, what I found out for this question:
SR-IOV is only supported on Cisco VIC1225 with KVM and Windows Hyper-V through VMFEX – which requires UCS FI.
As for the case of ESXi, there is no support for SR-IOV. The VMFEX for ESXi is done through the vmdirectpath2 method.
However, because I was looking to do this on ESXi 6.5, vmfex is not supported for that version and will not be – it is supported on earlier ESXi versions.
Currently the alternative is to use 3rd party adapters.
Here is, what I found out for this question:
SR-IOV is only supported on Cisco VIC1225 with KVM and Windows Hyper-V through VMFEX – which requires UCS FI.
As for the case of ESXi, there is no support for SR-IOV. The VMFEX for ESXi is done through the vmdirectpath2 method.
However, because I was looking to do this on ESXi 6.5, vmfex is not supported for that version and will not be – it is supported on earlier ESXi versions.
Currently the alternative is to use 3rd party adapters.