BCE(4)

📦 version 12.2, in debian bookworm, debian trixie, ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble, ubuntu questing, ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

💖 bce — the QLogic NetXtreme II driver, bestie edition 💖

okay so this is bce, from section 4 of the Kernel Interfaces Manual (that's the BCE(4) situation, iykyk). It's the driver for QLogic NetXtreme II (BCM5706/5708/5709/5716) PCI/PCIe Gigabit Ethernet adapters. Sit down, hydrate, and let's get into it 🫶

✨ NAME ✨

bce — the QLogic NetXtreme II (BCM5706/5708/5709/5716) PCI/PCIe Gigabit Ethernet adapter driver. That's the whole vibe. Networking, but make it NetXtreme II. 💅

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

so you wanna compile this driver into the kernel? then you gotta put these lines in your kernel configuration file, no skipping:

device miibus
device bce

orrr, if you'd rather load the driver as a module at boot time (valid, honestly), put this line in loader.conf(5):

if_bce_load="YES"

either way, we get there. periodt ✨

🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

The bce driver supports QLogic's NetXtreme II product family, which includes the BCM5706, BCM5708, BCM5709 and BCM5716 Ethernet controllers.

The NetXtreme II product family is made up of various Converged NIC (or CNIC) Ethernet controllers, and they support a TCP Offload Engine (TOE), Remote DMA (RDMA), and iSCSI acceleration, plus standard L2 Ethernet traffic — all on the same controller. multitasking icon behavior, honestly 👑

The following features are supported in the bce driver under FreeBSD:

  • IP/TCP/UDP checksum offload
  • Jumbo frames (up to 9022 bytes)
  • VLAN tag stripping
  • Interrupt coalescing
  • 10/100/1000Mbps operation in full-duplex mode
  • 10/100Mbps operation in half-duplex mode

The bce driver supports the following media types:

  • autoselect — Enable autoselection of the media type and options. The user can manually override the autoselected mode by adding media options to rc.conf(5).
  • 10baseT/UTP — Set 10Mbps operation. The ifconfig(8) mediaopt option can also be used to select either full-duplex or half-duplex modes.
  • 100baseTX — Set 100Mbps (Fast Ethernet) operation. The ifconfig(8) mediaopt option can also be used to select either full-duplex or half-duplex modes.
  • 1000baseSX — Sets 1000Mbps operation. Only full-duplex mode is supported at this speed. that's just the rules bestie 💅
  • 1000baseT — Set 1000baseT operation over twisted pair. Only full-duplex mode is supported.
  • 2500BaseSX — Set 2500Mbps operation. Only full-duplex mode is supported.

The bce driver supports the following media options:

  • full-duplex — Force full duplex operation.
  • half-duplex — Force half duplex operation.

For more information on configuring this device, see ifconfig(8). 🦋

💜 HARDWARE 💜

The bce driver provides support for various NICs based on the QLogic NetXtreme II family of Gigabit Ethernet controllers, including the following:

  • QLogic NetXtreme II BCM5706 1000Base-SX
  • QLogic NetXtreme II BCM5706 1000Base-T
  • QLogic NetXtreme II BCM5708 1000Base-SX
  • QLogic NetXtreme II BCM5708 1000Base-T
  • QLogic NetXtreme II BCM5709 1000Base-SX
  • QLogic NetXtreme II BCM5709 1000Base-T
  • QLogic NetXtreme II BCM5716 1000Base-T
  • Dell PowerEdge 1950 integrated BCM5708 NIC
  • Dell PowerEdge 2950 integrated BCM5708 NIC
  • Dell PowerEdge R710 integrated BCM5709 NIC
  • HP NC370F Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC370T Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC370i Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC371i Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC373F PCIe Multifunc Giga Server Adapter
  • HP NC373T PCIe Multifunction Gig Server Adapter
  • HP NC373i Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC373m Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC374m PCIe Multifunction Adapter
  • HP NC380T PCIe DP Multifunc Gig Server Adapter
  • HP NC382T PCIe DP Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC382i DP Multifunction Gigabit Server Adapter
  • HP NC382m DP 1GbE Multifunction BL-c Adapter

look at that lineup. it's giving certified baddie hardware compatibility list ✨👑

🧚 SYSCTL VARIABLES 🧚

The following variables are available as both sysctl(8) variables and loader(8) tunables. yes bestie, both. double the access, double the slay 💅

  • hw.bce.verbose — Enable/Disable verbose logging and output to the console. Useful for debugging (default 0).
  • hw.bce.msi_enable — Enable/Disable MSI support (default 1).
  • hw.bce.tso_enable — Enable/Disable TSO support (default 1).
  • hw.bce.strict_rx_mtu — Enable/Disable strict RX frame size checking (default 0).
  • hw.bce.hdr_split — Enable/Disable frame header/payload splitting (default 1).
  • hw.bce.rx_pages — Set the number of memory pages assigned to receive packets by the driver. Due to alignment issues, this value can only be of the set 1, 2, 4 or 8 (default 2).
  • hw.bce.tx_pages — Set the number of memory pages assigned to transmit packets by the driver. Due to alignment issues, this value can only be of the set 1, 2, 4 or 8 (default 2).
  • hw.bce.rx_ticks — Time in microsecond ticks to wait before generating a status block updates due to RX processing activity. Values from 0-100 are valid. A value of 0 disables this status block update. Cannot be set to 0 if hw.bce.rx_quick_cons_trip is also 0 (default 18).
  • hw.bce.rx_ticks_int — Time in microsecond ticks to wait during RX interrupt processing before generating a status block update. Values from 0-100 are valid. Valid values are in the range from 0-100. A value of 0 disables this status block update (default 18).
  • hw.bce.rx_quick_cons_trip — Number of RX Quick BD Chain entries that must be completed before a status block is generated. Values from 0-256 are valid. A value of 0 disables this status block update. Cannot be set to 0 if hw.bce.rx_ticks is also 0 (default 6).
  • hw.bce.rx_quick_cons_trip_int — Number of RX quick BD entries that must be completed before a status block is generated duing interrupt processing. Values from 0-256 are valid. A value of 0 disables this status block update (default 6).
  • hw.bce.tx_ticks — Time in microsecond ticks to wait before a status block update is generated due to TX activitiy. Values from 0-100 are valid. A value of 0 disables this status block update. Cannot be set to 0 if hw.bce.tx_quick_cons_trip is also 0 (default 80).
  • hw.bce.tx_ticks_int — Time in microsecond ticks to wait in interrupt processing before a status block update is generated due to TX activity Values from 0-100 are valid. A value of 0 disables this status block update (default 80).
  • hw.bce.tx_cons_trip — How many TX Quick BD Chain entries that must be completed before a status block is generated. Values from 0-100 are valid. A value of 0 disables this status block update. Cannot be set to 0 if hw.bce.tx_ticks is also 0 (default 20).
  • hw.bce.tx_cons_trip_int — How many TX Quick BD Chain entries that must be completed before a status block is generated during an interrupt. Values from 0-100 are valid. A value of 0 disables this status block update (default 20).
lowkey there's more coming bestie, don't go anywhere 💖

💀 DIAGNOSTICS 💀

ok bestie, this is the part where the driver is basically yelling at you in dmesg. Every one of these starts with bce%d — that %d is the interface number, so if you've got more than one card you know exactly which one is being dramatic. Let's go one by one, no skips, no "oh I'll read that later". 🫶

  • bce%d: PCI memory allocation failed! — fatal initialization error, the driver hit a wall it can't get past. RIP.
  • bce%d: PCI map interrupt failed! — again, fatal initialization error. The driver is not okay and it's telling you.
  • bce%d: Unsupported controller revision (%c%d) — the controller revision you've got is not one this driver supports. It's giving "wrong era, wrong vibe" 😭.
  • bce%d: Controller initialization failed! — fatal initialization error. Yeah. That one.
  • bce%d: NVRAM test failed! — the driver could not access the controller NVRAM correctly.
  • bce%d: DMA resource allocation failed! — the driver could not allocate DMA memory to set up the controller's host memory data structures.
  • bce%d: Interface allocation failed! — the driver could not create a network interface for the controller.
  • bce%d: PHY probe failed! — the driver could not access the PHY used by the controller.
  • bce%d: Failed to setup IRQ! — the driver could not initialize the IRQ handler.
  • bce%d: Error: PHY read timeout! — the driver could not read a PHY register before the timeout period expired. tick tock, bestie ⏰
  • bce%d: PHY write timeout! — the driver could not write to the PHY register because a timeout occurred.
  • bce%d: Timeout error reading NVRAM at offset 0x%08X! — the driver could not write to NVRAM because a timeout occurred. (yes, the message says reading and the explain says write, that's literally what the page says, I don't make the rules 🙈)
  • bce%d: Unknown Flash NVRAM found! — the driver does not recognize the NVRAM device being used and therefore cannot access it correctly.
  • bce%d: Invalid NVRAM magic value! — the driver cannot read NVRAM, or the NVRAM is corrupt.
  • bce%d: Invalid Manufacturing Information NVRAM CRC! — the driver cannot read NVRAM, or the NVRAM is corrupt.
  • bce%d: Invalid Feature Configuration Information NVRAM CRC! — the driver cannot read NVRAM, or the NVRAM is corrupt.
  • bce%d: DMA mapping error! — the driver was unable to map memory into DMA addressable space required by the controller.

ok now we're in the DMA tag saga. It's long. It's fine. It's giving structured, methodical, obsessed with details and honestly? respect 💅

  • bce%d: Could not allocate parent DMA tag! — the driver could not allocate a PCI compatible DMA tag.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate status block DMA tag! — the driver could not allocate a DMA tag for the controller's status block.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate status block DMA memory! — the driver could not allocate DMA addressable memory for the controller's status block.
  • bce%d: Could not map status block DMA memory! — the driver could not map the status block memory into the controller's DMA address space.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate statistics block DMA tag! — the driver could not allocate a DMA tag for the controller's statistics block.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate statistics block DMA memory! — the driver could not allocate DMA addressable memory for the controller's statistics block.
  • bce%d: Could not map statistics block DMA memory! — the driver could not map the statistics block memory into the controller's DMA address space.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate TX descriptor chain DMA tag! — the driver could not allocate a DMA tag for the controller's TX chain.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate TX descriptor chain DMA memory! — the driver could not allocate DMA addressable memory for the controller's TX chain.
  • bce%d: Could not map TX descriptor chain DMA memory! — the driver could not map the TX descriptor chain memory into the controller's DMA address space.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate TX mbuf DMA tag! — the driver could not allocate a DMA tag for the controller's TX mbuf memory.
  • bce%d: Unable to create TX mbuf DMA map! — the driver could not map the TX mbuf memory into the controller's DMA address space.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate RX descriptor chain DMA tag! — the driver could not allocate a DMA tag for the controller's RX chain.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate RX descriptor chain — the driver could not allocate DMA addressable memory for the controller's RX chain. (yes that one really does just stop like that mid-sentence, iconic honestly 💀)
  • bce%d: Could not map RX descriptor chain DMA memory! — the driver could not map the RX descriptor chain memory into the controller's DMA address space.
  • bce%d: Could not allocate RX mbuf DMA tag! — the driver could not allocate a DMA tag for the controller's RX mbuf memory.
  • bce%d: Unable to create RX mbuf DMA map! — the driver could not map the RX mbuf memory into the controller's DMA address space.
  • bce%d: Firmware synchronization timeout! — the driver was not able to synchronize with the firmware running on the controller. The firmware may be stopped or hung. ghosted by the firmware fr 👻
  • bce%d: Invalid Ethernet address! — the driver was not able to read a valid Ethernet MAC address from NVRAM.
  • bce%d: Reset failed! — fatal initialization error has been encountered.
  • bce%d: Byte swap is incorrect! — fatal initialization error. Contact the author with details of the CPU architecture and system chipset in use. This one's a tell-someone situation, not a suffer-in-silence situation 🫶
  • bce%d: Firmware did not complete initialization! — fatal initialization error.
  • bce%d: Bootcode not running! — fatal initialization error.
  • bce%d: Error mapping mbuf into RX chain! — the driver could not map a RX mbuf into DMA addressable memory.
  • bce%d: Error filling RX chain: rx_bd[0x%04X]! — the driver was unable to allocate enough mbufs to fill the RX chain during initialization. Try increasing the number of mbufs available in the system, increase system memory, or if using jumbo frames, make sure enough 9KB mbufs are available.
  • bce%d: Failed to allocate new mbuf, incoming frame dropped! — the driver was unable to allocate a new mbuf for the RX chain and reused the mbuf for the received frame, dropping the incoming frame in the process. Try increasing the number of mbufs available in the system or increase system memory. that frame? gone. dropped. deceased. 😭
  • bce%d: Controller reset failed! — a fatal initialization error has occurred.
  • bce%d: Controller initialization failed! — a fatal initialization error has occurred.
  • bce%d: Block initialization failed! — a fatal initialization error has occurred.
  • bce%d: Error mapping mbuf into TX chain! — the driver could not map a TX mbuf into DMA addressable memory.
  • bce%d: Error registering poll function! — the driver received an error while attempting to register the poll function.
  • bce%d: Changing VLAN_MTU not supported. — changing the VLAN MTU is not currently supported by the driver.
  • bce%d: Cannot change VLAN_HWTAGGING while management firmware (ASF/IPMI/UMP) is running! — management firmware to support ASF/IPMI/UMP requires that VLAN tag stripping be enabled in the controller.
  • bce%d: Changing VLAN_HWTAGGING not supported! — disabling VLAN tag stripping is not currently supported by the driver.
  • bce%d: Watchdog timeout occurred, resetting! — the device has stopped responding to the network, there is a problem with the cable connection, or a driver logic problem has occurred. cable check first bestie, it's always the cable 🔌
  • bce%d: Fatal attention detected: 0x%08X! — a controller hardware failure has occurred. If the problem continues, replace the controller. not a vibe. not fixable with vibes either. 💀

🫶 SUPPORT 🫶

Got a support question? Please contact your QLogic approved reseller, or QLogic Technical Support at http://support.qlogic.com, or by E-mail at ⟨support@qlogic.com⟩. They're the ones who actually know things, go ask them ✨

👀 SEE ALSO 👀

altq(4), arp(4), miibus(4), netintro(4), ng_ether(4), vlan(4), ifconfig(8)

go read those too, they're the supporting cast and they ate 🎀

🌸 HISTORY 🌸

The bce device driver first appeared in FreeBSD 6.1. a whole era ✨

👑 AUTHORS 👑

The bce driver was written by David Christensen ⟨davidch@broadcom.com⟩. king behavior, thank you for your service 🫡💖

and that's a wrap on the whole page, bestie!! this one came from the Debian peeps, dated June 4, 2012, and it lives under the name BCE(4). go forth, read your dmesg, and know exactly what the drama means 💅🌈

📦 where this page comes from