Dell PowerConnect 5224 User Manual - Page 25

The Spanning Tree page contains links to pages that allow you to specify the parameters of the Spanning Tree Protocol: • Bridge Settings • Advanced Bridge Settings • Port Settings • Trunk Settings Bridge Settings The Bridge Settings page contains the following information: • Bridge ID - Identifies a unique identifier for the switch in the Spanning Tree. The ID is calculated using the defined Spanning Tree priority of the switch and its MAC address. The lower the Bridge ID, the more likely the switch acts as the root. • Max Age - The maximum time, in seconds, that the switch can wait without receiving a configuration message before attempting to reconfigure. All device ports, except for designated ports, should receive configuration messages at regular intervals. If the root port ages out STP information (provided in the last configuration message), a new root port is selected from among the device ports attached to the network. References to "ports" in this section means "interfaces," which includes both ports and trunks. • Hello Time - Specifies the time interval, in seconds, at which the root device transmits a configuration message. • Forward Delay - The maximum time, in seconds, that the switch waits before changing states (such as, discarding to learning to forwarding). This delay is required because every device must receive information about topology changes before it starts to forward frames. In addition, each port needs time to listen for conflicting information that would make it return to a discarding state; otherwise, temporary data loops might result. • Designated Root - Identifies the priority and MAC address of the device in the Spanning Tree that the switch has accepted as the root device. Addendum to the 3 248 and 52 24 User 's Guides 25