HP 2424M - Manual (Page 18)

HP ProCurve Switch 4000M / 8000M / 2424M / 1600M Reviewer’s Guide
Some servers also support link aggregation, allowing multiple links to be interconnected between the
switch and server.
Up to 4 links of any one type can be used in either the FEC or HP trunk and a total of 10 trunks (FEC,
HP Trunk and Switch Mesh) can be configured at one time in the HP ProCurve
Switch 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M.
2.10.1 Implementation of Cisco's Fast EtherChannel ®
The HP ProCurve
Fast EtherChannel ports
Switches 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M
implement Cisco’s Fast
EtherChannel® (FEC) technology.
FEC provides support for the Port
Aggregation Protocol (PAgP), a
Cisco proprietary protocol that aids
Switch 1 Switch 2
trunked together act as one
Switch 3
in configuration of the FEC links. This allows the HP ProCurve Switches 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M
switches to be compatible with other PAgP compliant switches, routers and servers.
Traffic running across an FEC trunk is load-balanced across the different physical links, providing the
most complete use of the available bandwidth.
In addition, if one of the links in the trunk goes down, data is carried across the remaining links
providing redundancy to the overall link.
Look at the FEC white paper on Cisco's web site for more details on server support.
2.10.2 HP Trunking
The HP ProCurve Switches 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M also implement HP Trunks. HP Trunks are
available in a number of other HP switches making the HP ProCurve
Switch 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M compatible with the link aggregation solution of these other
switches.
HP Trunks will also work with other trunk technologies that do not use a protocol across the trunks,
including FEC trunks that have PAgP disabled. In fact, if a FEC defined trunk in a HP ProCurve
Switch 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M is connected to a switch or server that does not support PAgP on
their trunks, it will automatically try to connect using the HP Trunk. As a result, a trunk on the
4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M can be set up initially as FEC and have the greatest chance of
interoperating with another switch or server.
2.11 Filtering
2.11.1 Layer 2 and Layer 3 Filtering
The HP ProCurve Switch 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M support various filtering at Layer 2 and Layer 3.
Traffic having the following frame types can be either forwarded or dropped on a per-port basis:
IP IPX ARP AppleTalk
DEC LAT NetBEUI SNA
In addition, filters for specific multicast addresses can be defined to forward or drop multicast traffic
on a per-port basis. Port filters can also be defined such that traffic from a specific port can be
forwarded or dropped on a per-port basis.
Judicious use of the filters can streamline traffic flows or create security walls. For example, many
networks have workgroups using a particular protocol that do not need to communicate outside their
group. If a graphics workgroup is using AppleTalk, but the traffic is not desired elsewhere on the
network, an AppleTalk filter in the HP ProCurve Switch 4000M/8000M/2424M/1600M will prevent the
AppleTalk traffic from consuming bandwidth outside the workgroup. Alternatively, if a file server is
©1998, 1999, 2000 Hewlett-Packard Co Revision 3.2b – 1/15/2000 Page 18 of 36