Introduction To Switched Networks

Chapter 1:
Introduction to
Switched Networks
Switched Networks
© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 1

How About in 2014?
 At the Provincials ….

How About in 2014?
 At the Provincials ….

How About in 2014?
 At the Nationals ….

How About in 2014?
 At the Nationals ….

Chapter 1
 1.1 LAN Design
 1.2 The Switched Environment

Chapter 1: Objectives
 Describe the convergence of data, voice, and video in the
context of switched networks.
 Describe a switched network in a small-to-medium-sized
business.
 Explain the process of frame forwarding in a switched
network.
 Compare a collision domain to a broadcast domain.

LAN Design

Legacy Telephone Equipment

Separate Networks
Voice Network
Video Network
Data Network

Converged Networks
 Convergence combines voice and video communications on a
data network.
 The impact of moving a conventional company architecture to

a completely converged network creates a shared
infrastructure resulting in a single network to manage.
 A primary benefit of a converged network is that there is just

one physical network to install and manage.
• Results in substantial savings over the installation and management
of separate voice, video, and data networks.

Converged Networks
 To support collaboration, business networks employ
converged solutions using voice systems, IP phones, voice
gateways, video support, and video conferencing.

Converged Networks
 The convergence of services onto the data network has
resulted in an evolution in networks.
 It’s gone from a traditional data transport role, to a super-

highway for data, voice, and video communication.
 Therefore, the converged network must be properly designed

and implemented to allow the reliable handling of the various
types of information that it must carry.
• A structured design is required to allow management of this complex
environment.

Borderless Networks
 The Cisco Borderless Network provides an architectural
approach that embeds intelligence, simplifies operations, and
is scalable to meet demands of the converged network.
 It can connect anyone, anywhere, anytime, on any device -

securely, reliably, and seamlessly.
 It provides the framework to unify wired and wireless access

across many different device types.

Borderless Networks

Borderless Networks

Borderless Networks
 Borderless networks are built using following principles:
Network Design
Explanation
Principles
• Facilitates understanding the role of each device at every
Hierarchy tier, simplifies deployment, operation, and management,
and reduces fault domains at every tier.
• Allows seamless network expansion and integrated

Modularity service enablement on an on-demand basis.
• Satisfies user expectations by keeping the network

Resiliency operational.
• Allows intelligent traffic load sharing by using all network

Flexibility resources.
 These are not independent principles, therefore, understanding how each

principle fits in the context of the others is critical.

Borderless Networks
 Designing a borderless switched network in a hierarchical
fashion allows network designers to overlay security, mobility,
and unified communication features.
 There are two time-tested and proven hierarchical design

frameworks for campus networks.
Three-tier hierarchical model Two-tier hierarchical model

Borderless Networks
 Introducing modularity into the campus hierarchical design
further ensures that the campus network remains resilient and
flexible enough to provide critical network services.
 Modularity also helps to allow for growth and changes that

occur over time.

Switched Networks

Role of Switched Networks
 Switched networks incorporate the following features:
• Layer 3 functionality
• Quality of service
• IP telephony
• Security
• Wireless networking
• Mobility
 Meeting the requirements of next generation networks:

• Secure
• Reliable and always available
• Support converged network traffic such as data, voice, video, security
systems, and more

Switch Considerations
 There are various types of enterprise switches and the
following are features to consider when selecting them.
Consideration Explanation
• Cost of a switch depends on the number and speed of the

Cost interfaces, supported features, and expansion capability.
• Network switches must support the appropriate number of

Port Density devices on the network.
• Some switches support Power over Ethernet (PoE) .

Power • Some chassis-based switches support redundant power supplies.
Reliability • Switch should provide continuous access to the network.
Port Speed • Speed of the network connection.
Frame Buffers • Switch should be able to store frames for congested ports.
Scalability • Switch should provide the opportunity for growth

Switch Form Factor
 Switch form factor refers to the type of switch and the
thickness of it when mounted in a rack.
 The thickness of the switch is expressed in number of rack

units (e.g., 1U, 2U, ….).
 Network designers must choose between:

• Fixed configuration switch
• Modular configuration switch
• Stackable or non-stackable switch

Fixed Configuration Switches
 Fixed configuration switches are basically “what you see is
what you get” and they do not support features or options
beyond those that originally came with it.
1U

Modular Switches
 Modular configuration switches are more flexible and typically
come with different sized chassis supporting various modular
line cards that fit into the switch chassis.

Stackable Switches
 These switches can be interconnected using a special cable.
• They can be daisy-chained and effectively managed as one large
switch using the Cisco StackWise technology.

L2 and L3 Switches
 Switches are also identified as either:
• Layer 2
• Layer 3 (or multilayer switch)
 L3 switches are typically deployed in the core and distribution

layers of an organization's switched network.
• They can build a routing table, support a few routing protocols, and
forward IP packets at a rate close to that of Layer 2 forwarding.
• Multilayer switches often support specialized hardware, such as
application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs).

L2 and L3 Switches
 There is a trend in networking toward a pure Layer 3 switched
environment.
• Access layer switches are usually L2 switches.
 Most switches now support routing and it is likely that soon all
switches will incorporate a route processor because the cost
of doing so is decreasing relative to other constraints.
• Eventually the term multilayer switch will be redundant.

1.1.2.5

Enterprise Level Switches
 Characteristics of enterprise level switches include:
• Port Density
• High Forwarding Rates
• Support for Link Aggregation
• Supports higher throughput by combining multiple switch ports

Port Density
 This is the number of ports available on a single switch.
 Remember, some of these ports will be used to interconnect

the switch to the rest of the network!
Forwarding Rate
 Defines the processing capabilities of a switch by rating how
much data the switch can process per second.
• Switch product lines are classified by forwarding rates.
• Entry-layer switches have lower forwarding rates than enterprise-
layer switches.

Forwarding Rate
 Wire speed describes the theoretical maximum data
transmission rate that each port on the switch is capable of
attaining
• Because access layer switches are physically limited by their uplinks
to the distribution layer they don’t need to operate at full wire speed.
 Therefore use:
• Less expensive, lower performing switches at the access layer
• More expensive, higher performing switches at the distribution and
core layers where forwarding rate makes a bigger impact.

Link Aggregation
 Are there enough ports on a switch to aggregate to support
the required bandwidth?
 A 24-port switch, with each port capable of running at gigabit

speed could generate up to 24 Gb/s of network traffic.
• What if this switch is connected to the network with one 1 Gbps link?
• Bandwidth contention would occur.
• Each port would get 1/24th of the available wire speed.
• Data would be forwarded more slowly.

Link Aggregation
 Link aggregation helps reduce traffic bottlenecks by allowing
up to 8 switch ports to be bound together for data
communications.
• Link aggregation supports higher throughput by combining multiple
switch ports.

Power over Ethernet (PoE)
 Allows the switch to deliver power to a device over the existing
Ethernet cabling.
• Can provide power to IP phones and wireless access points.

PoE Pass-Through Switches
 Some switches such as the Cisco Catalyst 2960-C and 3560-
C Series compact switches support PoE pass-through.
 PoE pass-through allows a

network administrator to
power PoE devices
connected to the switch, as
well as the switch itself, by
drawing power from certain
upstream switches.

Enterprise Switches
 There is no one switch to “switch them all”.
 An enterprise would require the services of many different

switches based on its function as a core, distribution, and
access layer.
Cisco Switches

Access Layer Switches
 Cisco Catalyst 2960 Series
 Cisco Catalyst 2960 and 2960-C Series Compact Switches

Catalyst 2960
 Entry-layer enterprise, medium-sized, and branch office
network switch
 Forwarding rates from 16 Gb/s to 32 Gb/s
 Multilayered switching
 QoS features to support IP communications
 Access control lists (ACLs)
 Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet connectivity
 Up to 48 10/100 ports or 10/100/1000 ports with additional
dual purpose gigabit uplinks
 No PoE support
 CLI, Web management, Network Assistant, console, AUX
access
Catalyst 2960

Distribution and Access Layer Switches
 Cisco Catalyst 3560-X Series
 Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series

Catalyst 3560
 Enterprise-class switch supports PoE, QoS, and advanced
security features (ACLs)
 Small enterprise LAN access or branch-office converged
network environments.
 Different fixed configurations:
• Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet connectivity
• Up to 48 10/100/1000 ports, plus four small form-factor pluggable
(SFP) ports
• Optional 10 Gigabit Ethernet connectivity in the Catalyst 3560-E
models
• Optional Integrated PoE (Cisco pre-standard and IEEE 802.3af); up
to 24 ports with 15.4 watts or 48 ports with 7.3 watts

Catalyst 3560

Catalyst 3750
 Access layer switches in midsize organizations and enterprise
branch offices
• Forwarding rates from 32 Gb/s to 128 Gb/s
 Supports Cisco StackWise technology

• StackWise technology allows up to 9 switches to be interconnected via
the use of a fully redundant backplane.
 Different stackable fixed configurations:

• Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet connectivity
• Up to 48 10/100/1000 ports, plus four SFP ports
• Optional 10 Gigabit Ethernet connectivity in the Catalyst 3750-E models
• Optional Integrated PoE (Cisco pre-standard and IEEE 802.3af); up to
24 ports with 15.4 watts or 48 ports with 7.3 watts
Catalyst 3750

Catalyst 4500
 Distribution Layer switch that provides multilayer switching for
enterprises, small- to medium-sized businesses, and service
providers.
• Forwarding rates up to 136 Gb/s
 Different modular configurations:

• Modular 3, 6, 7, and 10 slot chassis offering different layers of
scalability
• High port density: up to 384 Fast Ethernet or Gigabit Ethernet ports
available in copper or fiber with 10 Gigabit uplinks
• PoE (Cisco pre-standard and IEEE 802.3af)
• Dual, hot-swappable internal AC or DC power supplies
• Advanced hardware-assisted IP routing capabilities

Catalyst 4500

Core and Distribution Layer Switches
 Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series
 Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series

Catalyst 6500
 Optimized for secure, converged voice, video, and data
networks.
 Can manage traffic at the distribution and core layers.
 Highest performing Cisco switch

• Supports forwarding rates up to 720 Gb/s.
 Very large network environments found in enterprises,

medium-sized businesses, and service providers.

Core Layer: Catalyst 6500

Catalyst 6500
 Different modular configurations:
• Modular 3, 4, 6, 9, and 13 slot chassis
• LAN/WAN service modules
• PoE up to 420 IEEE 802.3af Class 3 (15.4W) PoE devices
• Up to 1152 10/100 ports, 577 10/100/1000 ports, 410 SFP Gigabit
Ethernet ports, or 64 10 Gigabit Ethernet ports
• Dual, hot-swappable internal AC or DC power supplies
• Advanced hardware-assisted IP routing capabilities

1.1.3.6

The Switched
Environment

Switching as a General Concept
 The fundamental concept of switching refers to a device
making a decision based on two criteria:
• Ingress port
• Destination address
 A LAN switch maintains a MAC Address Table that it uses to

determine how to forward traffic through the switch

Dynamically Populating a MAC Address Table
 As the switch learns the relationship of ports to devices, it
builds a table called a MAC address, or content addressable
memory (CAM) table.

Switch Forwarding Methods
 Application-specific-integrated circuits (ASICs) reduce the
packet-handling time, and allow the device to handle an
increased number of ports without degrading performance.
 Two Methods of forwarding frames:

• Store-and-Forward - makes a forwarding decision on a frame after
it has received the entire frame and checked the frame for errors.
• Cut-Through - begins the forwarding process after the destination
MAC address of an incoming frame and the egress port has been
determined.
 NOTE:
• Cisco switches now all use Store and Forward

Selective Forwarding
Cut-Through Fragment Free Store-and-Forward

Lowest Latency Low Latency Highest Latency
No error checking Checks for collisions All errors filtered
(Filters most errors)
Lowest Latency Highest Latency
Less Error Checking More Error Checking

1.2.1.7

Collision Domains
 Each port on the switch represents a new segment.
 Each new segment is a collision domain.

Broadcast Domains
 Switches do not filter broadcast frames therefore a collection
of interconnected switches forms a single broadcast domain.
 Routers are used to segment both collision and broadcast

domains

Alleviating Network Congestion
 Characteristics of switches that contribute to alleviating
network congestion:
Characteristics Explanation
High port density • Large enterprise switches may support many hundreds of ports.
Large frame
• The ability to store many received frames.
buffers
• Depending on the cost of a switch, it may be possible to support a
mixture of speeds.
Port speed • Ports of 100 Mb/s, and 1 or 10 Gb/s are common (100 Gb/s is
also possible).
Fast internal • Having fast internal forwarding capabilities allows high
switching performance.
• Switches provide high-port density at a lower cost and can
accommodate network designs featuring fewer users per
Low per-port cost segment, therefore, increasing the average available bandwidth
per user.

1.3.1.3

Summary

Chapter 1: Summary
 The trend in networks is towards convergence using a single set of wires
and devices to handle voice, video, and data transmission.
 Network resources must now be seamlessly available anytime and
anywhere.
 The Cisco Borderless Network architecture enables different elements to
work together and allow users access to resources from any place at any
time.
 The traditional three-layer hierarchical design model divides the network
into core, distribution, and access layers. It provides modularity, resiliency,
and flexibility.
 In some networks the functionality of the core layer and the distribution
layer are often collapsed together.
 It is important to deploy the appropriate types of switches based on
network requirements.

Chapter 1: Summary (cont.)
 The network designer must choose between a fixed or modular
configuration, and stackable or non-stackable type of switch.
 A network administrator may choose to implement a multilayer switch.
 Multilayer switches are able to build a routing table, support a few routing
protocols, and forward IP packets at a rate close to that of Layer 2
forwarding.
 Switches use either store-and-forward or cut-through switching.
 Every port on a switch forms a separate collision domain allowing for
extremely high-speed full-duplex communication.


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Chapter 1:

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 1

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 2

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 3

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 4

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 5

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 6

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 7

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 8

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 9

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 10

 The impact of moving a conventional company architecture to

 A primary benefit of a converged network is that there is just

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 11

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 12

 It’s gone from a traditional data transport role, to a super-

 Therefore, the converged network must be properly designed

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 13

 It can connect anyone, anywhere, anytime, on any device -

 It provides the framework to unify wired and wireless access

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 14

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 15

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 16

• Allows seamless network expansion and integrated

• Satisfies user expectations by keeping the network

• Allows intelligent traffic load sharing by using all network

 These are not independent principles, therefore, understanding how each

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 17

 There are two time-tested and proven hierarchical design

Three-tier hierarchical model Two-tier hierarchical model

 Modularity also helps to allow for growth and changes that

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 19

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 20

 Meeting the requirements of next generation networks:

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 21

• Cost of a switch depends on the number and speed of the

• Network switches must support the appropriate number of

• Some switches support Power over Ethernet (PoE) .

Reliability • Switch should provide continuous access to the network.

Port Speed • Speed of the network connection.

Scalability • Switch should provide the opportunity for growth

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 22

 The thickness of the switch is expressed in number of rack

 Network designers must choose between:

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 23

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 24

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 25

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 26

 L3 switches are typically deployed in the core and distribution

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 27

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 28

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 29

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 30

 Remember, some of these ports will be used to interconnect

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 32

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 33

 A 24-port switch, with each port capable of running at gigabit

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 34

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 35

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 36

 PoE pass-through allows a

© 2014 Cisco and Bob Vachon All rights reserved. 37

 An enterprise would require the services of many different