CONSIDERATIONS USING THE THUNDERSWITCH PORT TRUNKING AND LOAD SHARING FEATURES

Port trunking and load sharing bundle two or more ports together to function as a single link to another switch. The effect is to increase bandwidth in the link. Without port trunking, the maximum bandwidth in a link between a pair of switches is determined by the media speed of the link. Combining links together via port trunking or load sharing increases the bandwidth to multiples of links.

This application report describes how to use the port trunking and load sharing features in Texas Instruments (TIä) ThunderSWITCHä products and presents a detailed description of these features in the following devices:

TNETX3190

TNETX3110

TNETX3151

TNETX3270

TNETX4020

TNETX4090

First, the application report defines in detail both port trunking and load sharing and describes the differences between the two. Networking examples demonstrate the flexibility given to the end-user by enabling this feature. Next, how port trunking and load sharing fit into some of the standard protocols (VLAN, spanning tree, and other IEEE Standards) is described. Then the actual register definitions are explained.

Go to the Engineering Design Center to locate information on other TI Semiconductor devices.

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