284 The Green and Virtual Data Center
Channel, Ethernet, or FCoE HBAs. SR-IOV implementations do not allow
different physical servers to share adapter cards. MR-IOV builds on SR-IOV
by enabling multiple physical servers to access and share PCI devices such as
HBAs and NICs safely with transparency. The primary benefit of PCI IOV is
to improve utilization of PCI devices, including adapters or mezzanine cards,
as well as to enable performance and availability for slot-constrained and
physical footprint- or form factor-challenged servers. Caveats of PCI IOV are
distance limitations and the need for hardware, firmware, operating system,
and management software support to enable safe and transparent sharing of
PCI devices.
9.5.5 Convergence Enhanced Ethernet ...