Chelsio Terminator 3 (T3) 10 Gigabit Ethernet adapters
A family of Chelsio's second-generation 10 Gigabit Ethernet server adapters (the T302, T310, T320 and related boards) that shipped in the mid-to-late 2000s and were aimed at high-throughput data center, storage, and HPC workloads. Chelsio classified these T3 adapters as discontinued around 2012, with newer T4/T5/T6 generations taking over the same role.
recommendation
Worth keeping but flagging as legacy because the T3 silicon was discontinued by Chelsio years ago and current Chelsio products use the newer T4/T5/T6 generations served by the cxgb4 driver. Even so, upstream still merged genuine bug fixes for cxgb3 as recently as 2022 and 2023, suggesting some legacy servers and appliances are still in service, so removal would be premature. Marking it as obsolete hardware in the documentation would help users understand they should plan migrations to cxgb4-class adapters.
repository signals
sources
- lore.kernel.org
Netdev saw a real cxgb3 bug-fix patch in 2022, indicating the driver still receives upstream maintenance when issues are found.
- lore.kernel.org
Netdev also carried a cxgb3-specific fix in 2023, so the driver is not abandoned even if traffic is modest.
- chelsio.com
Chelsio classifies T3 adapters as legacy/discontinued, so the hardware is no longer a current product line.
- chelsio.com
Chelsio's current product lineup is centered on newer Terminator generations rather than T3.
- store.chelsio.com
Chelsio's 2025-era store lists current adapters from newer families, not T3 boards, supporting that T3 is no longer sold new.
- git.kernel.org
Upstream Kconfig separates CXGB3 from newer Chelsio T4/T5/T6 support, with cxgb4 being the natural modern replacement for the same vendor/use-case class.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
Real driver directory. Local code inspection via exec_command identified it as the Chelsio T3 driver and showed T3 board names (T302/T310/T320 etc.); lore_activity on cxgb3_main.c/cxgb_up found real netdev fixes in 2022-2023; lore_file_timeline showed the path still appears in recent kernel traffic, though much of that is stable/treewide churn rather than feature work. A removal-discussion query via lore_regex timed out and a fallback lei query was blocked by sandbox, so there is no positive evidence of an active removal series. Web search found Chelsio's discontinued T3 page plus current-product pages showing newer generations only. Conclusion: hardware is obsolete and probably limited to legacy servers/appliances, but upstream still accepts occasional fixes, so deprecate/remove would be premature; keep the driver, but annotate as legacy/obsolete hardware.