900-9X661-0083-ST1 Nvidia Connectx-6 25GBE Dual-port PCIE 4.0 Adapter Card

Nvidia Connectx-6 25GBE Dual-port Adapter Card

The Nvidia 900-9X661-0083-ST1 ConnectX-6 25GBE Dual-Port PCIe 4.0 Adapter Card is a high-speed networking solution designed for enterprise servers, cloud computing, and advanced data center environments. It ensures reliable connectivity, enhanced bandwidth, and secure performance.

Main Information

• Manufacturer: Nvidia
• Model Number: 900-9X661-0083-ST1
• Category: Professional Network Adapter Card

Technical Specifications

Physical Dimensions

• Size: 4.89 in. x 2.71 in. (124.22mm x 68.90mm)
• Connector Type: Dual SFP28 Ethernet (supports copper and optical media)

Capabilities

• Secure Boot enabled for enhanced protection
• Crypto functionality supported for secure data transmission

Protocol Support

• Data Rate: 1/10/25 Gb/s
• Ethernet Standards: 25GBASE-R, 20GBASE-KR2, 10GBASE-LR, 10GBASE-ER, 10GBASE-CX4, 10GBASE-CR, 10GBASE-KR, SGMII, 1000BASE-CX, 1000BASE-KX, 10GBASE-SR
• PCI Express: Gen 3.0/4.0 SerDes 16.0 GT/s, 8 lanes (backward compatible with PCIe 2.0 and 1.1)

Power and Airflow Specifications

Voltage and Current

• Voltage: 3.3V auxiliary
• Maximum Current: 100mA

Power Consumption

• Typical Power (Passive Cables): PCIe Gen 3.0 - 10.88W / PCIe Gen 4.0 - 11.29W
• Maximum Power (Passive Cables): PCIe Gen 3.0 - 15.55W / PCIe Gen 4.0 - 15.96W

Environmental Specifications

Temperature Range

• Operational: 0°C to 55°C
• Non-operational: -40°C to 70°C

Humidity Levels

• Operational: 10% to 85% relative humidity
• Non-operational: 10% to 90% relative humidity

Compliance

• RoHS Compliant

Key Advantages

• High-speed 25GbE connectivity for demanding workloads
• Dual-port design for scalability and redundancy
• Secure boot and crypto-enabled features for data protection
• Optimized for enterprise servers and cloud environments

High-Performance 25GBE Ethernet Adapter Cards Overview

The Nvidia ConnectX-6 DX EN 25GbE Dual-port SFP28 PCIe 4.0 x8 Crypto Enabled Full-height Bracket Adapter Card belongs to an advanced category of intelligent network interface controllers designed for high-throughput enterprise workloads. This category focuses on ultra-low latency Ethernet connectivity combined with hardware-based acceleration for security, virtualization, and cloud-native environments. These adapter cards are engineered to meet the evolving demands of data centers, artificial intelligence infrastructures, high-performance computing clusters, and large-scale virtualization platforms.

ConnectX-6 DX adapters represent a generation of smart NICs that extend traditional networking capabilities by integrating offload engines for encryption, packet processing, and virtualization support directly into the hardware. This reduces CPU overhead and improves overall system efficiency while maintaining exceptional throughput and reliability.

Evolution of Smart Network Interface Technology

The development of smart Ethernet adapter cards has transformed how modern networks handle data-intensive workloads. Traditional NICs primarily provided connectivity, while newer smart NICs like the ConnectX-6 DX series introduce programmable and hardware-accelerated features that optimize data flow across distributed infrastructures.

These adapters operate over PCI Express 4.0 interfaces, allowing significantly higher bandwidth between the host system and the network. By utilizing dual 25GbE SFP28 ports, these cards deliver aggregated high-speed connectivity suitable for workloads such as machine learning model training, real-time analytics, software-defined storage, and secure multi-tenant cloud environments.

Role in Cloud and Virtualized Architectures

In modern cloud infrastructures, network performance and security play critical roles in maintaining service availability and scalability. Smart NICs in this category are optimized for virtual switching, overlay networking, and containerized workloads. Hardware-based offloading of networking functions reduces latency and ensures consistent performance even under heavy load.

ConnectX-6 DX adapters enable advanced features such as SR-IOV virtualization, RDMA over Converged Ethernet, and enhanced packet steering, allowing cloud providers and enterprises to deploy highly scalable virtual networks with minimal overhead.

PCIe 4.0 Integration for Bandwidth Efficiency

One of the defining features of this category is the use of PCIe 4.0 x8 interfaces. This high-speed bus architecture doubles the throughput of previous PCIe generations, ensuring that the adapter card can handle massive data transfers without becoming a bottleneck. The increased bandwidth is particularly beneficial for workloads that rely on continuous data streaming, large file transfers, and real-time processing.

25 Gigabit Ethernet Connectivity for Enterprise Networks

The 25GbE Ethernet standard has become a preferred choice for enterprise data centers due to its balance between performance, cost efficiency, and scalability. Adapter cards in this category leverage dual SFP28 ports to deliver reliable high-speed connectivity across switching fabrics and network backbones.

This level of bandwidth supports demanding applications such as high-frequency trading platforms, distributed databases, media streaming services, and large-scale backup operations. By providing two independent ports, these adapters offer redundancy and load balancing capabilities, enhancing network resilience and uptime.

SFP28 Optical and Direct Attach Cable Support

SFP28 ports are designed to support a variety of transceivers, including optical modules for long-distance fiber connectivity and direct attach copper cables for short-range, low-latency connections within data center racks. This flexibility allows network architects to tailor infrastructure deployments based on distance, power consumption, and cost considerations.

Within this category, adapter cards are optimized to ensure signal integrity and consistent throughput across different media types, maintaining performance standards required by mission-critical operations.

High Availability Network Design

Dual-port Ethernet adapters are commonly deployed in redundant network configurations. This approach ensures that if one network path experiences failure or congestion, traffic can be rerouted through the secondary port without service interruption.

High availability is a core principle of enterprise networking, and cards in this category support advanced teaming and failover mechanisms, enabling uninterrupted data flow across complex infrastructures.

Optimized Throughput for East-West Traffic

Modern data centers experience significant east-west traffic, which refers to data exchanged between servers within the same facility. High-speed Ethernet adapters play a crucial role in managing this internal traffic efficiently, ensuring fast communication between compute nodes, storage systems, and application clusters.

Hardware-Based Crypto Acceleration and Security

A major advancement within the ConnectX-6 DX category is integrated hardware crypto acceleration. These adapter cards are equipped with dedicated engines that handle encryption and decryption tasks directly on the NIC, freeing CPU resources for application workloads.

Security offloading improves performance for encrypted network traffic such as IPsec, TLS, and secure overlay networks. As data privacy regulations and cybersecurity threats continue to rise, hardware-based security becomes essential for maintaining compliance and protecting sensitive information.

Offloading Encryption for Performance Gains

Software-based encryption can significantly tax server processors, especially in high-throughput environments. By moving cryptographic operations to the network adapter, overall system efficiency improves while maintaining strong security standards.

These adapters are capable of handling secure tunnels, encrypted storage traffic, and protected virtual machine communications without compromising latency or bandwidth.

Secure Multi-Tenant Environments

In cloud computing platforms, multiple tenants often share the same physical infrastructure. Hardware crypto acceleration enables secure isolation of tenant traffic, preventing unauthorized access and ensuring data confidentiality.

This capability is particularly valuable for public cloud providers, financial institutions, and government organizations that require robust security at scale.

Compliance with Industry Security Standards

Network adapter categories that include crypto-enabled features are designed to meet various industry security requirements and certifications. These standards ensure proper encryption handling, key management, and secure data transmission across enterprise networks.

Advanced Offload Capabilities for Network Efficiency

Beyond encryption, ConnectX-6 DX class adapters include numerous offload features that optimize network performance. These include TCP segmentation offload, receive side scaling, flow steering, and virtualization-aware packet processing.

Offloading routine networking tasks to hardware reduces CPU utilization, enabling servers to handle more workloads with fewer resources. This results in lower operational costs and improved application responsiveness.

Remote Direct Memory Access Support

RDMA technology allows data to be transferred directly between system memory locations without involving the CPU. This dramatically reduces latency and increases throughput, making it ideal for high-performance computing, storage networking, and real-time analytics.

Adapters in this category support RDMA over Converged Ethernet, enabling organizations to build unified networks that carry both traditional Ethernet traffic and high-performance RDMA workloads.

Low-Latency Data Transfer for HPC Applications

High-performance computing clusters rely on ultra-low latency communication between nodes to process complex simulations, scientific research, and financial modeling tasks. Smart NICs with RDMA support play a critical role in achieving the performance levels required by these environments.

By minimizing overhead and accelerating data movement, these adapters help organizations maximize computational efficiency.

Optimized Storage Networking

In software-defined storage systems, fast and reliable data transfer is essential for maintaining performance. RDMA-enabled adapters improve storage access speeds and reduce latency, enabling high-speed access to distributed storage pools.

Form Factor and Mechanical Design Considerations

The full-height bracket design ensures compatibility with a wide range of enterprise servers and networking appliances. This standard form factor allows for easy installation in rack-mounted systems commonly used in data centers.

Adapter cards in this category are engineered for durability and thermal efficiency, featuring robust heat dissipation solutions to maintain performance under continuous high-load conditions.

Enterprise Server Compatibility

Full-height PCIe adapter cards are widely supported across major server manufacturers and platforms. This broad compatibility simplifies deployment and allows organizations to integrate high-speed networking solutions without major hardware changes.

These adapters are commonly used in multi-socket servers designed for virtualization, AI processing, and large-scale data handling.

Thermal Management and Reliability

High-speed networking components generate significant heat, especially during sustained throughput operations. Advanced thermal designs, including heat sinks and airflow-optimized layouts, ensure stable operation within enterprise server environments.

Reliable thermal management extends hardware lifespan and reduces the risk of performance throttling or system downtime.

Continuous Operation in Data Centers

Enterprise networking hardware is expected to operate continuously with minimal maintenance. Adapter cards in this category are built to withstand the rigorous demands of 24/7 data center operations, ensuring consistent performance and long-term reliability.

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Workloads

AI training clusters require massive data throughput between compute nodes and storage systems. High-speed Ethernet adapters with RDMA and offload capabilities significantly improve training times and model performance.

These adapters enable scalable AI infrastructures capable of handling large datasets and distributed processing tasks efficiently.

Enterprise Cloud Infrastructure

Private and hybrid cloud environments benefit from smart NIC technologies that enhance virtualization, security, and network efficiency. Adapter cards in this category allow enterprises to deploy robust cloud platforms with high performance and strong isolation between workloads.

Edge Computing and Real-Time Processing

As edge computing continues to grow, high-speed network connectivity becomes essential for processing data closer to the source. Smart Ethernet adapters enable low-latency communication between edge devices, centralized servers, and cloud platforms.

Scalability and Future-Ready Networking

The ConnectX-6 DX adapter category is designed with scalability in mind, supporting current enterprise workloads while preparing for future networking demands. PCIe 4.0 interfaces, 25GbE connectivity, and advanced offload features provide a foundation for expanding data center capacity.

Organizations can incrementally upgrade network infrastructure without overhauling entire systems, making these adapters a cost-effective solution for long-term growth.

Support for Software-Defined Networking

Modern networks increasingly rely on software-defined networking architectures to manage traffic dynamically and improve resource utilization. Smart NICs integrate seamlessly with SDN platforms, enabling programmable traffic control and real-time network optimization.

This flexibility allows IT teams to adapt network configurations quickly in response to changing workload requirements.

Integration with Containerized Environments

Container orchestration platforms such as Kubernetes depend on efficient networking to support microservices architectures. Adapter cards in this category provide enhanced networking performance and isolation for containerized workloads, ensuring consistent application behavior.

Preparing for Higher-Speed Ethernet Standards

While 25GbE remains a popular standard, data centers continue to evolve toward higher-speed Ethernet technologies. The architecture of ConnectX-6 DX class adapters allows for compatibility within scalable networking ecosystems, making future transitions smoother.