Broadcom NetXtreme II / QLogic Everest 10Gb Ethernet adapters
A family of Broadcom NetXtreme II 10 Gigabit Ethernet server adapters, codenamed Everest, covering the BCM57710/57711/57712 and 57800-series 57810/57811/57840 chips. They shipped widely in enterprise servers from roughly the late 2000s onward, were inherited by QLogic, and are still found in production data centers and even sold new in 2025.
recommendation
It should stay in the kernel because the hardware is still in active enterprise use and the driver is still receiving upstream maintenance: a net-next patch was posted in November 2025, Debian continues to ship a dedicated firmware-bnx2x package, and Red Hat still certifies cards like the BCM57810 for current releases. Resellers were even listing NetXtreme II 57810 adapters as new stock in 2025, so a sizeable installed base depends on this code with no drop-in replacement driver covering the same PCI IDs.
repository signals
sources
- spinics.net
A net-next patch for bnx2x was posted on 2025-11-12, showing current upstream maintenance activity rather than abandonment.
- bugs.debian.org
Debian still ships a dedicated firmware-bnx2x package in unstable as of version 20251111-1, indicating ongoing distro support for deployed hardware.
- shi.com
A Broadcom NetXtreme II 57810 adapter was listed by a major reseller in 2025 as a product offering, supporting that at least some hardware was still sold new in 2025.
- catalog.redhat.com
Red Hat's hardware catalog lists the NetXtreme II Broadcom BCM57810 10Gb Ethernet PCIe Adapter as certified hardware, supporting continued enterprise deployment.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
Local shell inspection of bnx2x_main.c identified the family as Broadcom/QLogic NetXtreme II 'Everest' covering BCM57710/57711/57712/57800/57810/57811/57840 devices. Web search found a 2025 net-next bnx2x patch on spinics, which is enough to treat the driver as actively maintained; I found no sourced removal/deprecation thread in the allotted search budget. Web search also found Debian firmware packaging plus Red Hat certification, which point to ongoing installed-base usage, and reseller listings show at least some new-in-channel availability in 2025. Because the hardware is old but still supported and still appears in enterprise/server legacy deployments, removal or deprecation is not justified; there is no single replacement driver for the same PCI IDs, so replacement_driver is null.