Q-Logic 8200 2. Windows Teaming Modes Continued, Failsafe Mode, Failover, Switch, System Fault

2–Configuring NIC Teaming/Bonding

Table 2-2. Windows Teaming Modes (Continued)

	Failover	Switch	System Fault	Load	Number of
Mode			Tolerance		Ports per Team
	Capability	Dependency		Balancing
			(SFT)		(Range a)
Dynamic	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	2–16
802.3ad

a16×16 ports can be aggregated per system: 16 ports per team and 16 teams per system.

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 either a locally administered MAC address or 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.

2-16 SN0054671-00 A