Link Aggregation Groups; Spanning Tree - HP Bc1500 - BladeSystem - Blade PC Supplementary Manual

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Figure 4 Browser-based interface for HP PC Blade Switch

Link aggregation groups

The HP PC Blade Switch complies with IEEE 802.3ad static and dynamic Link Aggregation Groups
(LAGs). The switch supports a maximum of eight multi-port trunks with up to eight ports per trunk.
IMPORTANT: Because the HP PC Blade Switch has only four physical uplinks, limit Link Aggregation to
a maximum of four physical trunk members for uplink ports. If you want to put the two blade PC NICs into
a LAG, a maximum of eight blade PCs can participate, assuming no external uplink ports are already
configured in a LAG. If all blade PCs need to run in a redundant NIC configuration, the Broadcom
Advanced Server Program (BASP) intermediate driver supports Smart Load Balancing for switch-indepen-
dent, bidirectional, fault-tolerant teaming, and load balancing.

Spanning Tree

Spanning tree protocol eliminates layer 2 loops within a network. Without the aid of loop detection, loop-
ing broadcast packets would lead to severe network congestion, causing a broadcast storm. The source-
based location method used to communicate between switches would cease to function properly, crip-
pling switch-based networks. Therefore, all well-designed networks need alternate redundant paths to
help mitigate infrastructural component failure.
The HP PC Blade Switch supports IEEE 802.1D (STP), 802.1w (RSTP), and 802.1s (MSTP). In most cases,
you should use default parameters in CCI network design, such as cost and priority. By default, the switch
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