Re: L3 Port Channel Question.

On Mon, Jan 4, 2010 at 16:00, Poplawski, James
<jpoplawski_at_starkinvestments.com> wrote:
> Greeting GS-ers,
>
> My question is more theoretical than anything. B If I have two switches connected to each other with redundant
> links what would the difference between a L3 Port Channel versus two switchports as Layer 3 interfaces running
> OSPF. B Wouldn't they both load balance the same way?

Technically speaking - no. CEF and EtherChannel on different platforms
use different load sharing algorithms. You may modify EtherChannel
behavior using "port-channel load-balance" command and you can modify
CEF behavior using "ip cef load-sharing". It's especially important to
understand that, at least on 3560, EtherChannel uses source MAC
address for making decisions, while CEF is using "hash" that consists
of source and destination IPs.

Practically speaking - it depends on your network design. It just may
end up producing the same result.

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Marko Milivojevic - CCIE #18427
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