Vogzone 25GbE NIC Card for Mellanox MCX4121A-ACAT, PCIe 3.0 x8 25Gb Ethernet NIC with Mellanox ConnectX-4 Lx Chipset, Dual SFP28 Network Card Support RDMA

It’s a 25G dual Mellanox dual Ethernet/rdma card for $100. Seems to work just like the name brand ones. I’ve run it at 25G with direct sfp cable, and 1G with sfp to rj45. I think it does not do 2.5G/5G

Used two of these to connect between my NAS and desktop PC. Both machines are running on Windows and neither had an issue working as soon as the network card was installed. My devices are relatively close so I am currently using DAC cables. In testing a file share in between my NVMe drive on the NAS and local PC I was able to get a transfer speed of 2.24GB/s, around 2,240 MB/s or ~19Gbps without any network adjustment or tuning whatsoever. The NVMe drives should be a bit faster than that but this was good enough for me, until I get more remote NVMe storage only a fraction of my data is available at these speeds anyways. HardwareIDs below as reported from device manager PCI\VEN_15B3&DEV_1015&SUBSYS_006915B3&REV_00 PCI\VEN_15B3&DEV_1015&SUBSYS_006915B3 PCI\VEN_15B3&DEV_1015&CC_020000 PCI\VEN_15B3&DEV_1015&CC_0200

I've bought around sixteen of these and they've all been solid. I don't have any brands/models to compare them to. So, I don't know if they could be any better. Nevertheless, I'm getting pretty close to full 25GiB in speed tests. I'm using these with Mikrotik switches and 10Gtek transceivers.

My first purchase was made on Aug 2024, it was a decent product with a nondescript package. The confusion comes when I was updating the firmware. The site claims the model to be MCX4121A-ACAT but I found it was detected as MCX4121A-ACUT, U for UEFI. This card has worked fine although I could not figure out how iscsi wouldn't work in BIOS. It works fine in windows but that is a different story. The speed in iperf3 comes at around 19.2-23.4 Gbps. I purchased the second time just recently in Mar 2025 and found that packaging and construction have become all different. Now it is clearly labelled as an ACAT model while still claiming UEFI functionality which caused further confusion. I ended up returning the second item without testing and switched to something different.

No problems

Installed and worked perfect.

One of the few 10GB variations that works natively in Proxmox. I bought 3 of these.

Installed easily and performs exactly as expected. Speeds are fast and stable, no drops under load. Dual ports make it flexible for different setups. For the price, it’s good value if you need a serious network upgrade.

I’ve been using the Vogzone 25 GBE dual-port NIC for a few weeks in my home server setup, and it’s been impressive. The card is powered by the Mellanox CONNECTX‑5 EN chipset, which makes it feel very robust and reliable, and the dual SFP28 ports provide a smooth 25 Gbps connection on both links. I’ve tested it with multiple devices on my network, and it handles high-bandwidth tasks like transferring large media files and running virtual machines without any noticeable lag or hiccups. The PCIe 3.0 x8 interface ensures the card has enough bandwidth for full speed, and it fits easily in my workstation without blocking other components. Another thing I really appreciate is the overall build quality and design. The card feels solid, and it hasn’t gotten hot even after extended use. Setup was straightforward, and the advanced features like RDMA and hardware offloads are a bonus if you need low-latency performance for storage or network-intensive applications. It’s also compatible with a range of SFP28 modules and DAC cables, which makes it versatile depending on your network infrastructure. Overall, this NIC is a high-performance, dependable upgrade for anyone looking to push beyond 10 GbE, whether for home labs, media servers, or small office networks.

This is a fairly decent 2-port 25 GigE NIC (SFP28) utilizing Nvidia/Mellanox ConnectX-5 chipset and PCIe 3.0 x8 (i.e. 64 Gbps) interface. It comes with a low-profile bracket should you have the need for it. Installation and setup is similar to most other NICs and there isn't anything fancy here. Btw, this appears to be a rebranded Lenovo ThinkSystem ConnectX-5 card since it uses Lenovo's driver although it's difficult to know for sure. In any event, you can use the common Twinax cable (copper) or AOC alternatives if you need longer runs (i.e. >= 15 meter) or if EMI is a concern. It's rated at 25 Gbps (3.125 GB/s raw, minus signal and protocol overhead) for each of the 25 GigE ports so at a minimum you'd need an PCIe 3.0 x8 to be able to achieve full speed for both ports simultaneously. If it's plugged into an x4 slot (assuming it's one that's electrically compatible), it'll likely max out at 16 Gbps per port. Given that PCIe 2.0 is almost 20 years old, chances are the motherboard you have would have PCIe 3.0 (or newer) instead which should work just fine as long as it fits (and it should be for ALL MBs) and it's an x8 slot so it can fully utilize all 8 lanes. It works without issues with ESXi 8 U2 and the latest drivers are dated 02/2024 so it's not too bad (for a lab). It's supposed to be supported by ESXi 9 as well but I haven’t tested that. Of course, it will also work with all supported versions of Windows and Linux. I do recommend that you update the drivers to the least for best performance. Performance wise, a quick test shows that it's at least capable of roughly 1.175 GB/s (9.40 Gbps) and that's decent and consistent with most other 10 GigE NICs since I don't have other 25 Gbps links to test. As aforementioned, Etherchannel using LACP won't allow multiple ports to be used simultaneously between any 2 hosts, so you'll still be limited by 10/25 GigE speed still; however, other devices with multiple 10/25 GigE ports or a host with a 2-port NIC such as this can simultaneously communicate to 2 hosts, each of which at 10/25 GigE speed, for a total combined throughput of 20/50 Gbps provided that all devices and software within the chain (i.e. end-to-end) support it. For those who are interested; ### # iperf3 -P1 -i20 -t 60 -c 10.10.10.13 # 1 thread Connecting to host 10.10.10.13, port 5201 [ 5] local 10.10.10.250 port 32735 connected to 10.10.10.13 port 5201 [ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr Cwnd [ 5] 0.00-20.00 sec 21.6 GBytes 9.28 Gbits/sec 168 234 KBytes [ 5] 20.00-40.00 sec 21.9 GBytes 9.40 Gbits/sec 131 221 KBytes [ 5] 40.00-60.00 sec 21.9 GBytes 9.39 Gbits/sec 15 321 KBytes - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr [ 5] 0.00-60.00 sec 65.4 GBytes 9.36 Gbits/sec 282 sender [ 5] 0.00-60.00 sec 65.3 GBytes 9.35 Gbits/sec receiver ### ≡ Value All things considered, this is a fairly decent (albeit typical and a bit outdated) 2-port 25 GigE NIC (SFP28) utilizing Nvidia/Mellanox ConnectX-5 chipset that's easy to install/setup (almost 8 yrs old) and for the most part works as expected without issues. It's somewhat reasonably priced at $250 for what it provides and its overall features, compatibility, versatility, and performance.

Powering this NIC is an embedded Mellanox X5 controller being able to handle 25 GBE high throughput bandwidth for building DIY servers. The interconnect does require some initial configuration, it detects as a ConnectX-5 network processor on Linux but isn't the easiest to setup. Card itself is precision engineered, using MOSFETS and power load balancing since it draws around 28W to 50W off the PCI-E bus connector directly. Heatsink is aluminum using spring loaded standoffs that manages to keep the chipset passively cooled even under benchmarking loads. Despite this, temperatures peaked around 75C to 80C which is on the higher end and better suited to having active server cooling. The card does slot into PCI-E Gen 3 connector and while backwards compatible on Gen 2, its bandwidth becomes limited by the onboard X8 length. Whether its networking GPU servers or connecting up RAID over SFP, the compatibility of this card was mostly plug & play after driver installation. Plugs do rely on SFP connectors which felt durable to slide into minimizing port level wobbling but lacks on proper shielding aside from its aluminum casing to disperse heat. The card PCB itself is multi layered and routes to full PCI-E x8 connector between the chipset. Since it can fit into servers, the included half length bracket is switchable using two screws and thoughtful inclusion.

I got this to connect my TrueNAS powered network storage to my network at max speed. My Unifi switch has dual 25gbps SFP+ ports and I was able to get one up and running. I haven't tested whenever Link aggregation works, but it may be a moot point as the two 25gbps ports are the only two at that speed. I also don't have a need for that level of speed... yet! Drivers were easy to come by and setup was relatively painless. Negotiating the connection took some manual input as the auto detect feature on my switch didn't work. So far, this has been an amazing NIC and has taken my data hoarding to a whole new level!

I recently upgraded parts of my home network to 10gbe and grabbed this to update my main PC which was still using the motherboard's onboard 2.5gig Ethernet. The card just pops into a free PCIE slot and unlocks speeds well beyond the 10gbe that most consumer level gear max out at, making it a great choice for futureproofing systems. The dual ports allows me to connect the second one directly to my NAS for better speeds without having to go through the router/switch. This is totally overkill for home use but if you need 10-25gbe this is a great NIC.