H3C IE4300-12P-PWR Installation Manual

Also see for IE4300-12P-AC: Compliance and Safety Manual

Contents

4-3NOTE:An IRF fabric is highly scalable. You can easily add new member devices to an IRF fabric after thefabric is set up.Master switchIRF uses two member roles: master and standby. When devices form an IRF fabric, they elect amaster to manage and control the IRF fabric, and all the other devices back up the master. An IRFfabric has only one master switch. When the master device fails, the other devices automaticallyelect a new master.Determine which switch you want to use as the master. You can affect the election result byassigning a high member priority to the intended master switch. For more information about themaster election, see IRF configuration in Virtual Technologies Configuration Guide in the set ofconfiguration guides for the switch series.IRF member IDsAn IRF fabric uses member IDs to uniquely identify and manage its members, and you must assigneach IRF member switch a unique member ID.IRF physical portsYou connect the IRF member switches through IRF interfaces, the logical interfaces for theconnections between IRF member switches. Each IRF member switch has two IRF interfaces:IRF-interface 1 and IRF-interface 2. To use an IRF interface, you must bind a minimum of onephysical port to it.When connecting two neighboring IRF member switches, you must connect the physical ports ofIRF-interface 1 on one switch to the physical ports of IRF-interface 2 on the other switch.The 10/100/1000BASE-T autosensing Ethernet ports and SFP ports on the switch can be used asIRF physical ports. Determine which of these ports are used as IRF physical ports based on yournetwork topology and connection scheme.The switch can provide GE IRF connections through physical ports, and you can bind several IRFphysical ports to an IRF interface for increased bandwidth and availability.Fabric topologyYou can create an IRF fabric in daisy chain topology or more reliable ring topology. In ring topology(as shown in Figure4-2), the failure of one IRF link does not cause the IRF fabric to split as in daisychain topology (as shown in Figure4-3). Instead, the IRF fabric changes to a daisy chain topologywithout interrupting network services. As a best practice, use a ring topology to create an IRF fabric.