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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Bonded CMs can be in either a static bonding group or dynamic bonding group to be moved by DBC load balancing. Also,
bonded modems within both General Load Balancing Groups and Restricted Load Balancing Groups may be load balanced
by DBC.
Note: If DBC load balancing takes place for a bonded modem, but the initialization technique configured for either its
general or restricted load balancing group is reinit-mac, then C4/c CMTS performs the broadcast-ranging init technique in
the DBC-REQ.
If non-bonded-dcc, bonded-dcc, bonded-ds-dbc, and bonded-us-dbc are all enabled, the order of precedence for choosing
a modem to be periodically load balanced with either DBC or DCC is:
Non-bonded CMs using DCC
Bonded CMs using DBC
Bonded CMs using DCC (in this case, the CM will reset due to the reinit-mac initialization technique)
Load balance moves take place within the same load balance group. This means the same MAC Domain Cable Modem
Service Group (MD-CM-SG).
DBC load balancing is based on either the Channel Utilization or CM Count method, the same as dynamic load balancing
with DCC.
Note that the C4/c CMTS considers whether the CM supports the 5-85 MHz extended upstream frequency range when
choosing a new channel set. If the CM does not support the extended range, any new channel set will not include an
upstream frequency in the extended range.
With DBC load balancing enabled:
When a bonded CM that belongs to a Restricted Load Balancing Group is moved by the DBC method, an attempt will
be made to maximize the number of RLBG channels in the new US or DS channel set.
If D3.0 Modem Steering is enabled, when a bonded CM is moved by the DBC method, an attempt will be made to
maximize the number of ATDMA channels in the new US channel set.
If D3.0 Modem Steering is enabled, and a bonded CM belongs to a Restricted Load Balancing Group, when it is moved
by the DBC method, an attempt will be made to maximize the number of RLBG channels, and secondarily the number
of ATDMA channels, in the new US channel set.
This helps to maximize the number of channels included in the CM's US and/or DS new channel sets.
Note that a modem will not be a candidate for DBC load balancing while its MD-CM-SG-ID (mCMsg) is zero, or when the
modem's fiber node name is blank. This can occur as the result of a topology change. Once the topology configuration has