Advanced Networking Features for Sun Blade and Rack Servers Multi-core and virtualized server environments are driving the need for greater networking performance. By efficiently load-balancing interrupts across CPU cores, these dual port 10 Gigabit Ethernet networking cards eliminate bottlenecks for high- performance applications in the data center. Implementation of Data Center Bridging standards for lossless and low latency Ethernet, FCoE support, along with innovations in Oracle Solaris enables data centers to converge server-to-server, server-to-storage and server-to-LAN communications onto a single Ethernet fabric. Built-in Virtualization Technology Server virtualization may reduce the number of physical servers, but it increases the demands placed on the network requiring additional capacity, capabilities and devices. Virtual networking capabilities are becoming increasingly important with the growing use of virtual machines, distributed applications, and cloud infrastructures. Oracle’s 10GbE SFP+ Ethernet networking cards can be deployed with SR-IOV, for OS supporting SR-IOV, in order to gain direct access to networking hardware for up to 128 virtual machines per networking card. Direct access to hardware from virtual machine environments increases performance and reduces the number of required adapters, cables, and switch ports. Additional hardware-based capabilities deliver I/O virtualization and quality-of- service features that eliminate bottlenecks and improves overall application performance. In addition, Oracle Solaris implements zero overhead server virtualization and Edge Virtual Bridging in order to improve both VM performance and improve traffic forwarding between VMs. Advanced networking and virtualization capabilities incorporated in Oracle Solaris and Oracle VM optimize database and application performance. These capabilities include:  Hardware accelerated traffic classification for Oracle Solaris 11 network virtualization with zones  Support for multiple Tx and Rx rings for improved scalability