C H A P T E R 1 - Overview of Sun Trunking 1.3 Software

C H A P T E R 1

Overview of Sun Trunking 1.3 Software

This chapter provides an overview of the Sun Trunking 1.3 software, including the hardware and software requirements for using this product. This chapter includes the following sections:

What is Sun Trunking?

Hardware and Software Requirements

Key Features

What is New in This Release?

Note - Sun Trunking 1.3 has been substantially enhanced to provide full IEEE 802.3ad compliance for existing customers. Accordingly, the syntax has been extended to support this enhancement. This enhancement is provided through patches available through the SunSolve. For more information, see Verifying and Installing Driver Patches.

What is Sun Trunking?

Sun Trunking 1.3 software provides the ability to aggregate multiple links so that they work in parallel as if they were a single link. Once aggregated, these point-to-point links operate as a single highly available "fat pipe" providing increased network bandwidth as well as high availability. For a given link level connection, trunking enables you to add bandwidth up to the maximum number of network interface links supported.

Sun Trunking 1.3 provides trunking support for the following network interface cards:

Sun Quad FastEthernet adapter

Sun Quad GigaSwift Ethernet adapter

Sun GigabitEthernet adapter

Sun GigaSwift Ethernet adapter

Sun Dual FastEthernet and Dual SCSI/P adapter

Sun Dual Gigabit Ethernet and Dual SCSI/P adapter

Sun Trunking 1.3 provides support for these adapters for Solaris 7, 8, 9, and 10 operating environment. Refer to the product documentation for both your adapter and your version of Solaris.

Hardware and Software Requirements

Before installing the Sun Trunking 1.3 software, make sure your system meets the following hardware and software requirements:

TABLE 1-1 Hardware and Software Requirements
Hardware and Software	Requirements
Hardware	Sun Ultra 60, Sun Ultra Enterprise 3x00, 4x00, 5x00, 6x00, E250, E450, Sun Enterprise 10000, 12000, 15000 Sun Fire 4800, Netra T3, T4, Sun Blade 100, 150, 1500, 2500 Netra T4. Sun Fire v20Z and v40Z
Network Interface Cards and drivers	Sun Quad FastEthernet adapter (`qfe` driver), Sun GigabitEthernet adapter (`ge` driver), Sun GigaSwift Ethernet adapter (`ce` driver), Sun Dual FastEthernet Dual SCSI/P adapter (`ce` driver) Sun Quad GigaSwift Ethernet adapter (`ce` driver), and Sun Dual Gigabit Ethernet and Dual SCSI/P adapter (`ce` driver)
OpenBoot PROM	Revision 3.x for SPARC platforms
Software	Solaris SPARC 7, 8, 9, or 10 Operating System Solaris 9 x86 or Solaris 10 x86 Operating System

CPU Requirements

Multiple trunks can be configured per server. However the total number of links aggregated depends on the server capability. As a general guideline you need a minimum of 1.25 MHz of CPU speed for every 1 Mbps of NIC bandwidth capability. Any number of aggregations is supported within this guideline.

Key Features

Sun Trunking 1.3 software implements the following key features:

Scalable, high density bandwidth

Automatic link-level failover

IEEE 802.3ad compliance with support for the Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP), which automatically detects and prevents illegal wiring configurations.

Dynamically add or remove trunk members

Load balancing based on policy: MAC address, Round Robin, IP Destination Address, or IP Source Address/IP Destination Address.

Command line interface (CLI) backward compatibility with Sun Trunking 1.2.1

Provides the ability to aggregate ports for the following drivers:

ce, ge--a maximum of four ports can be aggregated

qfe--a maximum of 16 ports can be aggregated

What is New in This Release?

New underlying software architecture for Sun GigaSwift Ethernet adapter (ce) support (ge and qfe remain the same)

Solaris 7, 8, 9, 10, Solaris 9 x86, and Solaris 10 x86 Operating System support

IEEE 802.3ad compliance through LACP and Marker Protocols.

Extended nettr(1M) interface:

add or remove individual links

modify trunking configuration parameters

conf option enhanced

debug option deprecated

Capability for multiple-IP streams into the driver for a single MAC address.

IPv6 support.

DR capability without unaggregating entire trunk on non-head instance

Four ge interfaces are supported (Trunking 1.2.1 supported only two interfaces.)

Automatic installation and removal of Trunking 1.3 software