Lenovo ThinkServer RD540 - Manual (Page 44)

8200 Series Converged Network Adapter and 3200 Series Intelligent Ethernet Adapter Page 26
Table 3 shows that failsafe and transmit load-balancing modes are switch independent, which means they
do not require switch configuration. LACP or 802.3ad require switch ports configured for LACP.
Failsafe Mode The failsafe mode provides Layer 2 fault tolerance. Failsafe provides high reliability
through redundancy in the event of port failure. When the primary network connection is down, data traffic
is automatically transferred to a secondary, standby connection. The preferred primary adapter can be
specified either by the system administrator or by the teaming driver (if the admin does not select the
preferred adapter). When the teaming driver needs to make the selection, it selects the best adapter in
terms of bandwidth, health, and capability. The preferred primary must always be a QLogic Adapter.
The administrator can also choose one of the following failback types to specify the behavior when
connection to the preferred primary is restored after a period of failure:
• None—When the preferred primary becomes operational again, the driver does not automatically
switch back the primary to the active adapter.
• Preferred Primary—When the preferred primary becomes operational again, the driver automatically
switches back the primary as the active adapter. The network traffic resumes to the primary adapter
from the standby adapter. The traffic stays with the secondary adapter only as long as the primary
adapter is down.
• Auto Select—Use this option to enable the teaming driver to automatically select the best adapter
based on parameters such as bandwidth, link state, health, and so on.
In failsafe mode, the standby adapter could be dissimilar in the individual features supported and capacity,
and may come from a different vendor.
All the adapters in the team share a common team MAC address. This is either a locally administered
MAC address or a default MAC address specified by the driver. Only one adapter at a time in the team is
active for network traffic. No two same MAC addresses are exposed to the switch at the same time.
Failsafe mode is inherent in all other teaming modes and is switch agnostic.
Table 3. Windows Teaming Modes
Mode
Failover
Capability
Switch
Dependency
System Fault
Tolerance (SFT)
Load
Balancing
Number of Ports
per Team (Range a )
a 16×16 ports can be aggregated per system: 16 ports per team and 16 teams per system.
Failsafe Yes: Layer 2 No Yes No 2–16
Transmit load
balancing
Yes No Yes Yes: Layers 3
or 4
2–16
Static
802.3ad
Yes Yes Yes Yes 2–16
Dynamic
802.3ad
Yes Yes Yes Yes 2–16