Dell S4820T, Configuration Manual

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13
Data Center Bridging (DCB)
NOTE:
DCB is not supported when you use 10GBaseT ports for stacking.
Ethernet Enhancements in Data Center Bridging
The following section describes DCB.
The S4820T system supports loading two DCB_Config files: FCoE_DCB_Config and iSCSI_DCB_Config .
These files are located in the root directory flash:/CONFIG_TEMPLATE. After copying the configuration
files to the startup config and reloading the system.
The device supports the following DCB features:
• Data center bridging exchange protocol (DCBx)
• Priority-based flow control (PFC)
• Enhanced transmission selection (ETS)
To configure PFC, ETS, and DCBx for DCB, refer to Sample DCB Configuration for the CLI configurations.
DCB refers to a set of IEEE Ethernet enhancements that provide data centers with a single, robust,
converged network to support multiple traffic types, including local area network (LAN), server, and
storage traffic. Through network consolidation, DCB results in reduced operational cost, simplified
management, and easy scalability by avoiding the need to deploy separate application-specific networks.
For example, instead of deploying an Ethernet network for LAN traffic, include additional storage area
networks (SANs) to ensure lossless Fibre Channel traffic, and a separate InfiniBand network for high-
performance inter-processor computing within server clusters, only one DCB-enabled network is
required in a data center. The Dell Networking switches that support a unified fabric and consolidate
multiple network infrastructures use a single input/output (I/O) device called a converged network
adapter (CNA).
A CNA is a computer input/output device that combines the functionality of a host bus adapter (HBA)
with a network interface controller (NIC). Multiple adapters on different devices for several traffic types
are no longer required.
Data center bridging satisfies the needs of the following types of data center traffic in a unified fabric:
LAN traffic LAN traffic consists of many flows that are insensitive to latency requirements,
while certain applications, such as streaming video, are more sensitive to latency.
Ethernet functions as a best-effort network that may drop packets in the case of
Data Center Bridging (DCB)
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