topic Re: which procurve switches support meshing? in Switches, Hubs, and Modems

which procurve switches support meshing?

Bernhard Jethan — Tue, 16 Nov 2004 14:37:54 GMT

hi there,

i've got a qustion regarding the meshing feature on procurve switches: which hp switches support the meshing technologie?

i found the "LAN Aggregation Through Switch Meshing" guide which describes the meshing algorithm and this paper tells me, that 8000m and 1600m support this feature.

what's about the L2 switches from a little bit newer generation like 2650 or 4100gl?

thank's a lot for you attention,

kind regards,

bernhard

Re: which procurve switches support meshing?

asdf_44 — Tue, 16 Nov 2004 20:17:48 GMT

The 5300 and 3400 line of switches also support meshing.

Re: which procurve switches support meshing?

Sergej Gurenko — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 02:24:37 GMT

You can use this document as a reference http://www.hp.com/rnd/pdfs/SWFeaturesMatrix27_May04.pdf
Look for "Switch Meshing" row. (Note: this is multipage doc)
You can always find new one on http://www.hp.com/rnd/software/index.htm

Re: which procurve switches support meshing?

Sietze Reitsma — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 04:14:29 GMT

Hello,

Only the feature line of HP supports meshing. In this case the 5300 series and the new 3400cl series.

remember if you mix 5300/3400 with 8000M ten you need to use backward compatability mode.

Hopefully this helps.

Best Regards,

S.

Re: which procurve switches support meshing?

Les Ligetfalvy — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 15:16:17 GMT

That meshing document is pretty old and you you can get more up to date info from the online docs for the specific switches that support meshing.

Keep in mind that while meshing is supported on some L3 switches, L3 routing cannot be combined with meshing. There is also a known issue with STP so RSTP should be deployed instead.

Re: which procurve switches support meshing?

Bjorn Tore Paulen — Thu, 18 Nov 2004 12:27:53 GMT

Which known issue regards STP and Meshing?

Re: which procurve switches support meshing?

Les Ligetfalvy — Thu, 18 Nov 2004 13:25:03 GMT

This is the way it was explained to me.

I have seen issues with HP meshing and STP (802.1d). The problem with STP is each and every time a user connects to a port, the port has to go thru the STP learning algorithm. During this period the mesh is notified of a topology change which can cause a MAC table to flush. For time sensitive applications I have seen this show up as a session disconnect because the mesh momentarily looses the MAC of one of the end node that is communicating.

RSTP (802.1w) is better equipped to handle this as each port by default does NOT go through the learning process.