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The 10GbE NIC That Just Works — Across Every Hypervisor, Every OS, Every Server Platform

The Broadcom 57412 is not the fastest. It is not the newest. It is the dual-port 10GbE SFP+ adapter that has shipped in millions of Dell, HPE, Lenovo, and xFusion servers since 2018, accumulating more driver maturity, more firmware stability, and more cross-platform compatibility testing than any 25GbE adapter on the market. It is the NIC you install in the server that runs AD, DNS, file services, and backup targets — servers where 25GbE throughput is unnecessary, but a NIC that causes a driver crash at 2 AM because of a kernel update is unacceptable.

Technical Specifications

Parameter	Specification
Chipset	Broadcom BCM57412 NetXtreme-E Series
Ports	2x SFP+ (10GbE / 1GbE), also supports SFP at 1GbE
Host Interface	PCIe 3.0 x8 (64 Gbps — sufficient for 2x 10GbE bidirectional)
RDMA	RoCE v2 (RDMA over Converged Ethernet)
Offloads	TCO (TCP Offload Engine), iSCSI offload, FCoE offload, NVMe-oF offload
SR-IOV	Up to 128 virtual functions per port
NPAR	NIC Partitioning — up to 4 physical functions per port (8 total)
VXLAN/NVGRE/GENEVE	Stateless offload for all three overlay protocols
Power	~8W typical (both ports active, 10GbE, DAC cables)
Form Factor	Low-profile PCIe, full-height bracket included
Physical	167 x 69 mm (standard LP PCIe card)
Cable	SFP+ DAC passive copper 1-7m, SFP+ SR optics up to 300m, SFP+ LR optics up to 10km
OS Support	VMware ESXi 6.7+ through 8.0+ (in-box driver for all versions), Windows Server 2016-2025, RHEL 7.x-9.x, SLES 12-15, Ubuntu 18.04-24.04
Driver	In-box for VMware ESXi 6.7+, Windows Server 2019+, RHEL 8.x+, Ubuntu 20.04+. No driver disk required at install time for any supported OS.
Compatible Servers	All Dell PowerEdge (14th-16th Gen), xFusion, Lenovo, HPE. Any server with PCIe 3.0 x8+ slot.
Warranty	3-year (with server)

Why Deployment Teams Choose the 57412 Over 25GbE for Infrastructure Servers

The 57412’s inbox driver support across every operating system version from the last decade means zero compatibility surprises. No driver compilation against a custom kernel. No firmware version mismatch with the hypervisor HCL. No Monday-morning call to the NIC vendor because the latest ESXi patch broke the out-of-tree driver. For infrastructure servers that need to boot reliably 365 days a year, inbox driver support is worth more than an extra 15 Gbps of throughput.

The second reason is cabling: SFP+ DAC passive copper cables cost $15-25 for a 3-meter cable. SFP28 DAC cables for 25GbE cost $25-40. The per-port cable cost difference is small, but across 200 servers with dual-port NICs, the SFP+ cable savings alone buy 2 additional servers.

57412 vs 57416 — 10GbE SFP+ vs 10GBASE-T

Feature	57412 (SFP+)	57416 (10GBASE-T, RJ45)
Cable	SFP+ DAC (copper, twinax) or SFP+ fiber optics	CAT6a/CAT7 copper (RJ45), up to 100m
Latency	< 1 microsecond (SFP+ DAC)	~2 microseconds (10GBASE-T PHY)
Power per port	~3W (SFP+ DAC)	~5-6W (10GBASE-T PHY)
Distance (no media converter)	7m (DAC) or 10km (SMF optics)	100m (CAT6a)
Best for	In-rack, low-latency, existing SFP+ switch infrastructure	Existing copper plant, long in-rack distances, RJ45 switch ports

Compatible Platforms

PCIe 3.0 x8 slot. Compatible with all Dell PowerEdge, xFusion FusionServer, Lenovo ThinkSystem servers. Broadcom NetXtreme-E driver is inbox on all supported operating systems — no driver disk, no post-install driver update required.