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Introduction 13
Layer 2 switching technology allows the GbE2 Interconnect Switch to look into data packets and redirect them based
on the destination MAC address. This reduces traffic congestion on the network because packets, instead of being
transmitted to all ports, are transmitted to the destination port only.
IEEE 802.1Q-based Virtual Local Area Network
The ProLiant BL p-Class GbE2 Interconnect Switch provides support for a total of 255 IEEE 802.1Q Virtual Local Area
Networks (VLANs) for server grouping and isolation. A VLAN is a network segment configured according to a logical
scheme rather than a physical layout. VLANs can be used to combine any collection of local area network (LAN)
segments into an autonomous user group that appears as a single LAN.
VLANs also logically segment the physical network into different broadcast domains so that packets are forwarded
only between ports within the VLAN. This technology enhances performance by conserving bandwidth and improves
security by limiting traffic to specific domains. For example, you may want to isolate the server blade iLO ports from
the rest of the NICs. The iLO ports on interconnect Switch B can be assigned to their own VLAN and go to a
dedicated uplink or share an uplink using VLAN tagging.
IMPORTANT: The greater the number of VLANs, the greater the GbE2 Interconnect Switch central processing
unit (CPU) utilization. For maximum interconnect switch performance, HP recommends that you be judicious
when configuring the number of VLANs.
Spanning Tree Protocol
The GbE2 Interconnect Switch supports IEEE 802.1D Spanning Tree Protocol (STP), which allows the blocking of links
that form loops between switches in a network. When multiple links between switches are detected, a primary link is
established. Duplicated links are blocked from use and become standby links. If the primary link fails, the standby link
is activated.
In addition, the GbE2 Interconnect Switch provides a spanning tree domain per VLAN. The switch is compatible with
Cisco® PVST+ and Cisco PVST, when the other device is configured as untagged or configured to use 802.1q
tagging. Sixteen spanning tree domains are supported per GbE2 Interconnect Switch.
Release 2.0 also provides IEEE 802.1s-based MSTP and IEEE 802.1w-based RSTP.
Simple Network Management Protocol
Each GbE2 Interconnect Switch can be configured and monitored remotely from a Simple Network Management
Protocol (SNMP)-based network management station. The GbE2 Interconnect Switch supports industry-standard SNMP
Management Information Bases (MIBs) and proprietary HP enterprise switch MIBs for fault detection and monitoring
of switch functionality. In addition, the GbE2 Interconnect Switch supports various environmental traps such as
temperature and fan failure traps.
To secure the management interface, the switch administrator can configure community strings with two levels of
access: Read and Read/Write. Access to the GbE2 Interconnect Switch can also be restricted to only management
stations that are members of a specific Internet Protocol (IP) network. This can be achieved by configuring the
address/mask of that specific network as a restricted management network address/mask.
Port mirroring
The GbE2 Interconnect Switch allows you to mirror one or multiple ports (source ports) to another port (destination
port) for network monitoring and troubleshooting purposes. This technology offers a way for network packet
analyzers to view the traffic moving through the GbE2 Interconnect Switches by providing a copy of the traffic that is
currently being passed through any other port. The packets are normally sent to a network packet analyzer or other
monitoring device attached to the mirror port.
Port trunking and load balancing
The GbE2 Interconnect Switch supports EtherChannel compatible IEEE 802.3ad (without LACP) port trunking allowing
several ports to be grouped together and act as a single logical link called a trunk. This feature provides a bandwidth
that is a multiple of the bandwidth of a single link. It also improves reliability since load balancing is automatically
applied to the ports in the trunked group. A link failure within the group causes the network traffic to be directed to
the remaining links in the group.
Trivial File Transfer Protocol support
Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) support allows the GbE2 Interconnect Switch firmware to be upgraded by
downloading a new firmware file from a TFTP server to the GbE2 Interconnect Switch. Firmware images of the GbE2