[dpdk-users] Packets drop while fetching with rte_eth_rx_burst

[Filip Janiszewski <contact@filipjaniszewski.com>]

Hi Everybody,

I have a weird drop problem, and to understand my question the best way
is to have a look at this simple (and cleaned from all the not relevant
stuff) snippet:

while( 1 )
{
    if( config->running == false ) {
        break;
    }
    num_of_pkt = rte_eth_rx_burst( config->port_id,
                                   config->queue_idx,
                                   buffers,
                                   MAX_BURST_DEQ_SIZE);
    if( unlikely( num_of_pkt == MAX_BURST_DEQ_SIZE ) ) {
        rx_ring_full = true; //probably not the best name
    }

    if( likely( num_of_pkt > 0 ) )
    {
        pk_captured += num_of_pkt;

        num_of_enq_pkt =
rte_ring_sp_enqueue_bulk(config->incoming_pkts_ring,
                                               (void*)buffers,
                                               num_of_pkt,
                                               &rx_ring_free_space);
        //if num_of_enq_pkt == 0 free the mbufs..
     }
}

This loop is retrieving packets from the device and pushing them into a
queue for further processing by another lcore.

When I run a test with a Mellanox card sending 20M (20878300) packets at
2.5M p/s the loop seems to miss some packets and pk_captured is always
like 19M or similar.

rx_ring_full is never true, which means that num_of_pkt is always <
MAX_BURST_DEQ_SIZE, so according to the documentation I shall not have
drops at HW level. Also, num_of_enq_pkt is never 0 which means that all
the packets are enqueued.

Now, if from that snipped I remove the rte_ring_sp_enqueue_bulk call
(and make sure to release all the mbufs) then pk_captured is always
exactly equal to the amount of packets I've send to the NIC.

So it seems (but I cant deal with this idea) that
rte_ring_sp_enqueue_bulk is somehow too slow and between one call to
rte_eth_rx_burst and another some packets are dropped due to full ring
on the NIC, but, why num_of_pkt (from rte_eth_rx_burst) is always
smaller than MAX_BURST_DEQ_SIZE (much smaller) as if there was always
sufficient room for the packets?

Is anybody able to help me understand what's happening here?

Note, MAX_BURST_DEQ_SIZE is 512.

Thanks