2910 vlan routing

[Mauro Furini]

hi all,
2910al perform intra vlan routing, but by your experience, when i must choose a 3500 ?
Where is the limit of 2910al for the routing?
I remember that the old 2650 goes down with some vlan and routing enable...

Thank's in advance

[Antonio Milanese]

Hello Mauro,

honestly i never checked the routing performance of 2910al. Typically it's a common low budget/entry level 10Gb solution referenced on C3000/C7000 setups before HP acquired 3com.
Anyway they use CPUs for control plane operations (however the CPUs are more powerful) so even if specs says 95 Mpps i doubt they can achieve the near line rate performances of Provision ASIC..may be 20/30 Mpps?

Regards,

Antonio

[Olaf Borowski · Accepted solution]

Mauro,

Antonio is wrong. Routing is not performed by the CPU but in ASIC. First packet in a flow hits the CPU, CPU figures out what to do with the packet and programs the ASIC to perform "routing" from there on. The box will perform line rate routing if that is needed. The only difference between the 2900 and 3500 are feature differences. Example: 3500 support VRRP, QinQ, OSPF etc. 2900 doesn't have the higher end protocoal but still performs line rate routing.

Hope this helps.

[Antonio Milanese]

Hi Olaf,

you are absolutly correct =)

i've double checked hp site and yes on PR/markering material they says that it's based on Provision ASIC:

http://h10144.www1.hp.com/network-pro-news/articles/mar09/2910-versatile.htm

though it's wierd that product quickspec/datasheet don't mention that fact nor , as on Provision ASIC models, report "switch/routing" capacity.

Oh well, nevermind i've learned something new and that's always a good thing =)

Regards,

Antonio

[Mauro Furini]

Thank's all for the reply.
Part of the doubt still remains...ok the 2910al perform hardware routing, then i may choose a 3500 only if I want OSPF, VRRP or PIM, but if I want only static routing i ever choose the 2900?
Thanks

[Olaf Borowski]

Mauro,
Yes, static routing and RIP is supported on the 2910 series product. If you don't need VRRP or OSPF etc., 2910al is a good choice.

http://h10144.www1.hp.com/products/switches/HP_ProCurve_2910al_Switch_Series/overview.htm

Routing table size is also different. 2910al only has 2000 entries but for a small network, that should be sufficient. The 2910al will do the job for you.