NVIDIA Mellanox ConnectX-5 Ex MCX556A-EDAT
PCIe 4.0 x16 Dual-Port 100Gb/s EDR InfiniBand & 100GbE VPI Adapter Card
Host Interface
PCIe 4.0 x16
Port Count
2
Port Speed & Connector Type
100Gb/s EDR InfiniBand or 100GbE, QSFP28
Protocol Mode
VPI — firmware-selectable InfiniBand or Ethernet
RDMA / Network Protocol
InfiniBand, RoCE v2
Product Description
The NVIDIA Mellanox ConnectX-5 Ex MCX556A-EDAT is a dual-port VPI adapter card delivering up to 100Gb/s throughput per port over either EDR InfiniBand or 100GbE Ethernet via QSFP28 connectors, with the mode selectable in firmware. As the 'Ex' variant of the ConnectX-5 family, it adds a PCIe 4.0 x16 host interface, doubling available host-to-adapter bandwidth compared to the standard PCIe 3.0 ConnectX-5 cards while retaining full feature parity for RDMA, NVMe-oF storage acceleration, and network virtualization. This makes it well-suited for newer PCIe Gen4 server platforms where maximizing host bandwidth alongside 100Gb/s networking is a priority. The card is widely OEM-qualified, with known cross-references including Lenovo and IBM system-vendor part numbers, reflecting its broad adoption across enterprise server platforms.