August 2008
Intermediate to advanced
816 pages
22h 34m
English
book
The All-New Switch Book: The Complete Guide to LAN Switching Technology, Second Edition
by Rich Seifert, James Edwards
Content preview from The All-New Switch Book: The Complete Guide to LAN Switching Technology, Second Edition
Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.
4.7. Switch Configurations
Most commercial switches are packaged and sold in one of three classes of configurations:
Bounded systems
Stackable switches
Chassis switches
The tradeoff among these is cost versus flexibility. Bounded systems offer the lowest cost and flexibility, while chassis switches offer the widest config-uration flexibility at a commensurably higher price. Stackable switches offer a compromise.
4.7.1. Bounded Systems
A bounded system provides a fixed, predetermined configuration. A given product will have a specified number of ports, port technologies, and data rates. There are generally no options to select, and no means of system expansion beyond the prescribed configuration. Figure 4-14 depicts a typical bounded switch.
Figure 4.14. Bounded system Courtesy of Cisco Systems
The primary advantage of a bounded configuration is that if the configuration provided matches the needs of the application environment, then it will be the lowest-cost solution available for the user. The user does not pay for expansion capabilities or options that are not needed in the target network. The obvious disadvantage is that, if the user's needs change such that the bounded system is no longer appropriate, the user must generally purchase a replacement switch because an upgrade or reconfiguration is not possible.
Because of their nature, bounded systems are most often manufactured ...
Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.
Read now
Unlock full access
More than 5,000 organizations count on O’Reilly
O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.Julian F.
I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.Addison B.
I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.Amir M.
I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.