aboutsummaryrefslogtreecommitdiffstats
path: root/docs/content/methodology/measurements/packet_latency.md
blob: f3606b5ffbe40ed820d149702a4497cd6f4b8676 (plain)
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
---
title: "Packet Latency"
weight: 2
---

# Packet Latency

TRex Traffic Generator (TG) is used for measuring one-way latency in
2-Node and 3-Node physical testbed topologies. TRex integrates
[High Dynamic Range Histogram (HDRH)](http://hdrhistogram.org/)
functionality and reports per packet latency distribution for latency
streams sent in parallel to the main load packet streams.

Following methodology is used:

- Only NDRPDR test type measures latency and only after NDR and PDR
  values are determined. Other test types do not involve latency
  streams.

- Latency is measured at different background load packet rates:

  - No-Load: latency streams only.
  - Low-Load: at 10% PDR.
  - Mid-Load: at 50% PDR.
  - High-Load: at 90% PDR.

- Latency is measured for all tested packet sizes except IMIX due to
  TRex TG restriction.

- TG sends dedicated latency streams, one per direction, each at the
  rate of 9 kpps at the prescribed packet size; these are sent in
  addition to the main load streams.

- TG reports Min/Avg/Max and HDRH latency values distribution per stream
  direction, hence two sets of latency values are reported per test case
  (marked as E-W and W-E).

- +/- 1 usec is the measurement accuracy of TRex TG and the data in HDRH
  latency values distribution is rounded to microseconds.

- TRex TG introduces a (background) always-on Tx + Rx latency bias of 4
  usec on average per direction resulting from TRex software writing and
  reading packet timestamps on CPU cores. Quoted values are based on TG
  back-to-back latency measurements.

- Latency graphs are not smoothed, each latency value has its own
  horizontal line across corresponding packet percentiles.

- Percentiles are shown on X-axis using a logarithmic scale, so the
  maximal latency value (ending at 100% percentile) would be in
  infinity. The graphs are cut at 99.9999% (hover information still
  lists 100%).