Re:A PCIe network interface card that adds full router capab...
by Alupis on Friday April 01, 2022 @03:27PM
(#30882293)
Top of rack requires space, which must be paid for monthly in a colo'ed environment, or reduces usable space (ie. revenue generating space) for hosting/cloud providers.
Done in actual host CPU consumes resources.
Direct programming on a chipset is a lot more complicated than running an off the shelf router.
Yes this is a niche product - but your proposed alternatives are silly in most cases where just slapping a zero U device into an unused PCIe port is far less complicated, less expensive, and easier to maintain.
This thing costs less than $200, a one time cost. Just reading the Broadcom documentation alone will cost your organization more than that...
Seriously, there isn't a good problem here that this solution solves that isn't better done elsewhere.