Windows Teaming Modes - Dell Qlogic QME8242 User Manual

3–Adapter Management Applications
Windows Management Applications
Failover
Mode
Capability
Failsafe Yes: Layer 2 No
Tx load balancing Yes
Static 802.3ad Yes
Dynamic 802.3ad Yes
16×16 ports can be aggregated per system: 16 ports per team and 16 teams per system.
a
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 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 a locally
administered MAC address or can be 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.
3-30
Table 3-2. Windows Teaming Modes
Switch
(System Fault
Dependency
Yes
No Yes
Yes Yes
Yes Yes
SFT
Load
Balancing
Tolerance)
No
Yes: Layers 3 or 4 2-16
Yes
Yes
Number of
Ports per
Team
(Range )
a
2-16
2-16
2-16
CU0354602-00 A