3Com 2916-SFP User Guide - Page 186

186 APPENDIX B: DEVICE SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES Table 11 Features of the Baseline Switch 2916-SFP Plus and Switch 2924-SFP Plus (continued) Feature Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) Class Of Service (CoS) Command Line Interface Configuration File Management DHCP Clients Fast Link Full 802.1Q VLAN Tagging Compliance IGMP Snooping Link Aggregated Groups Description ARP converts between IP addresses and MAC (i.e., hardware) addresses. ARP is used to locate the MAC address corresponding to a given IP address. This allows the switch to use IP addresses for routing decisions and the corresponding MAC addresses to forward packets from one hop to the next. Provide traffic belonging to a group preferential service (in terms of allocation of system resources), possibly at the expense of other traffic. The Command Line Interface (CLI) is an interface using a serial connection that allows basic features to be configured, including IP address management and firmware upgrading. The CLI is not intended as the main interface for the switch. The device configuration is stored in a configuration file. The Configuration file includes both system wide and port specific device configuration. The system can display configuration files in the form of a collection of CLI commands, which are stored and manipulated as text files. Dynamic Host Client Protocol. DHCP enables additional setup parameters to be received from a network server upon system startup. DHCP service is an on-going process. STP can take up to 30-60 seconds to converge. During this time, STP detects possible loops, allowing time for status changes to propagate and for relevant devices to respond. 30-60 seconds is considered too long of a response time for many applications. The Fast Link option bypasses this delay, and can be used in network topologies where forwarding loops do not occur. IEEE 802.1Q defines an architecture for virtual bridged LANs, the services provided in VLANs and the protocols and algorithms involved in the provision of these services. An important requirement included in this standard is the ability to mark frames with a desired Class of Service (CoS) tag value. IGMP Snooping examines IGMP frame contents, when they are forwarded by the device from work stations to an upstream Multicast router. From the frame, the device identifies work stations configured for Multicast sessions, and which Multicast routers are sending Multicast frames. Link Aggregated Group (LAG). The system provides up-to eight Aggregated Links may be defined, each with up to eight member ports, to form a single. LAGs provide: ■ Fault tolerance protection from physical link disruption ■ Higher bandwidth connections ■ Improved bandwidth granularity ■ High bandwidth server connectivity ■ LAG is composed of ports with the same speed, set to full-duplex operation.