The Net Card 3 add-on board is a 4 x 5GbE network card designed to be exclusively used with the ODROID-H3 and H4 series.

The Net Card 3 has the same size and shape as the existing NetCard v1 and v2. You also fix it to the H3 and H4 boards similarly. If you want to learn more about the existing Net Card v1 and v2, go to: Net Card for ODROID-H Series )

The four Ethernet controllers on the Net Card 3 are high-speed 5GbE Realtek RTL8126 chipsets.

Each controller/chipset maintains transmission and reception capability at high speed, and in the process, each controller significantly emits more heat than a 1GbE or 2.5GbE chipset. For this reason, the NetCard 3 includes a rectangular heat sink with fins covering the four controllers to prevent possible slow speed down or even link down due to overheating. Do NOT remove the heat sink while operating the NetCard 3.

Note!! : The H3 or H4 BIOS functions such as Wake on LAN, PXE Network Boot, Display information, etc do not apply to the controllers on the Net Card 3.

Compatible cases

ODROID-H4 : ODROID-H4 Case Type 2 / ODROID-H4 Case Type 3 / ODROID-H4 Case Type 4

ODROID-H3 : ODROID-H3 Case Type 5 / ODROID-H3 Case Type 6 / ODROID-H3 Case Type 7

Performance

Sending mode

Receiving mode

Results

As visible in the above charts, the more iperf3 sessions run in parallel, the more CPU usage we see increasing step by step.

The throughput is keeping a little over 18,000 Mbps in forward mode and a little under 18,000 Mbps in reverse mode when the four Ethernet ports are running simultaneously.

As we witnessed with 1GbE connections, we get a max iperf3 throughput of about 945 Mbps. With 2.5GbE connections, we get a max iperf3 throughput of about 2.35 Gbps. With 5GbE connections, we get a max iperf3 throughput of about 4.6 Gbps. The difference from the theoretical 1, 2.5 and 5GbE is, as always, due to the various overheads: bytes been copied through the IP stack, PCIe overhead and SerDes overhead in the Ethernet chipset.

Conclusion

The H4 can therefore provide excellent support for parallel clients, with enough remaining CPU resources to proceed with computation and disk IO. The H4 with a Netcard 3 is powerful enough to drive the performance of the 5G Ethernet high speed.

The 5GbE Netcard 3 brings a significant added value to an H4-based NAS solution or Router/Gateway where parallel clients can enjoy the full 5 GbE speed independently from each other.

To get further information, please visit the wiki page.