What Is Infiniband

InfiniBand is a high-performance, low-latency networking technology designed specifically for data centers and high-performance computing (HPC) environments. It provides significantly faster data transfer rates and lower latency than traditional networking technologies like Ethernet.

Key Features of InfiniBand

• High Bandwidth: Supports data rates from 10 Gbps up to 200 Gbps per port in modern implementations
• Ultra-Low Latency: Typically under 1 microsecond, compared to 10+ microseconds for Ethernet
• RDMA Capability: Remote Direct Memory Access allows data to transfer directly between the memory of connected systems without CPU involvement
• Scalability: Designed to connect thousands of nodes in large computing clusters
• Reliability: Built-in error correction and quality of service features

Common Use Cases

InfiniBand is primarily used in:

• High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters
• Supercomputers
• Large-scale data centers
• AI and machine learning infrastructure
• Storage area networks requiring high throughput

How It Compares to Ethernet

While Ethernet dominates general networking, InfiniBand offers advantages in specialized environments:

Sources and Further Reading

• InfiniBand Trade Association
• NVIDIA Mellanox InfiniBand Solutions
• OpenFabrics Alliance
• IEEE Spectrum: “InfiniBand: The Quiet Revolution”