650FLB Adapter - nic name change after FW update

[Nikolape]

Hello all,

I have one question regarding BL460c server, and its card (FlexFabric 20Gb 2port 650FLB). After applying SPP 2018.09, NIC names have changed:

BEFORE SPP:

~ # esxcli network nic list
Name PCI Device Driver Link Speed Duplex MAC Address MTU Description
------ ------------- ------ ---- ----- ------ ----------------- ---- -----------------------------------------------------------
vmnic0 0000:006:00.0 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:e8 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic1 0000:006:00.1 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:f0 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic2 0000:006:00.6 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:eb 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic3 0000:006:00.7 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:f3 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic4 0000:006:00.4 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:ea 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic5 0000:006:00.5 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:f2 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter

AFTER SPP:

~ # esxcli network nic list
Name PCI Device Driver Link Speed Duplex MAC Address MTU Description
------ ------------- ------ ---- ----- ------ ----------------- ---- -----------------------------------------------------------
vmnic0 0000:006:00.0 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:e8 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic1 0000:006:00.1 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:f0 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic2 0000:006:00.4 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:ea 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic3 0000:006:00.5 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:f2 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic4 0000:006:00.6 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:eb 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter
vmnic5 0000:006:00.7 elxnet Up 20000 Full 1c:98:ec:08:eb:f3 1500 Emulex Corporation HP FlexFabric 20Gb 2-port 650FLB Adapter

vmnic2 is now vmnic4, vmnic 3 is now vmnic5 and so on. Am I mistaking somewhere, or this is some kind of FW bug?

Thanks in advance.

Regards,
Nikola.

[Nikolape]

Hello to all,

Since there were no reply's, I will write down about what I have found on this topic:

VMware KB article which shows the way about how NIC aliases can be changed. Also, what I found interesting is this part:

"Note: In rare cases, aliases can change across an ESXi upgrade or patch installation, as a side effect of a bugfix or workaround having been added in ESXi's parsing of firmware device location information."

Since ESXi version was 5.5 here, I can only imagine that this is OS related issue, in a way on how it reads FW info.. But definitely different version of firmware was applied (SPP 2018.09). 

BR,
Nikola.