Chapter 31: Load Balancing
STANDARD Revision 1.0
C4® CMTS Release 8.3 User Guide
© 2016 ARRIS Enterprises LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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Registration Time Load Balance Actions
The load balance activities that occur during modem registration time or immediately following include:
Receive Channel Set (RCS) Assignment
Transmit Channel Set (TCS) Assignment
Modem Steering
Receive Channel Set Assignment
The Receive Channel Set (RCS) Assignment and Balancing Control feature provides for DOCSIS 3.0 modems to be
distributed to the least loaded primary and non-primary downstream channels at the time of registration.
When a CM sends a bonded registration request and the CM is in an MD-CM-SG that corresponds to an enabled load
balance group, the C4/c CMTS will attempt to assign a Receive Channel Set (RCS) that includes the least loaded
downstreams in the MD-CM-SG. The RCS is sent to the modem in the registration response prior to registration. This only
applies to DOCSIS 3.0 CMs since DOCSIS 2.0b CMs do not support changing their primary DS channel when they register.
When assigning the RCS for DOCSIS 3.0 CMs, the C4/c CMTS may change both the primary and non-primary downstreams
in the RCS sent in the registration response based on load on the DS channels in the MD-DS-SG.
Load balancing of the downstreams in the RCS only occurs when all of the following are true:
The modem is a DOCSIS 3.0 modem with Multiple Receive Channel Mode (MRCM) enabled for both the MAC Domain
and the modem.
The MD-CM-SG of the CM corresponds to a General Load Balance group that is enabled.
The CM's General Load Balance group is associated with a load balance policy that is enabled (i.e. the load balancing
rule that the policy references is set to enabled).
The CM must not be on the exclude list.
RCS load balancing is enabled.
This feature is most effective at balancing channel load when dynamic bonding groups and dynamic Receive Channel
Configurations (RCCs) are enabled. This is because dynamic bonding groups will provide the maximum number of
downstreams to choose from when attempting to find the least loaded downstream set for the RCS. Also, this feature is to
be used with general, i.e., not restricted, load balancing groups.
RCS load balancing continues even when periodic load balancing has been globally disabled by any of the following
methods: