Thank you.
Yes, bonding is an option - but requires allowing bonding at the switch - which is not an option for us at the moment.
So - we gave each NIC port its own IP and subnet - and are sending data concurrently to both ports - as if they were 2 independent NIC cards.
In other words - we are assuming that a single 2-port NIC can be made to behave like two 1-port NICs. That's the key question.
Trying to establish whether streaming 2 independent 10Gbit streams to the 2 ports is being governed down by the NIC card, by the firmware, by linux, or by the switch.
???