The concept EtherChannel has arrived from Cisco as a LAN switch-to-switch technique, which is port link aggregation technology dispenses fault-tolerant speed links between the servers, switches, and routers. EthernetChannel is the one-one relationship that connects only two devices. The basic aim of this concept is to allow various or multiple physical links into one single link i.e., one logical channel, The physical links can be Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet or 10- gigabit Ethernet channel. These physical link interfaces are combined into a port-channel interface. Each EthernetChannel is having an interface (logical port-channel) which all physical interfaces are allocated to that channel interface
We can take a look at the benefits of EtherChannel technology: Implementation tasks can be done on EthernetChannel instead of implementing or configuring on every single port. We can manage load balancing, redundancy on cisco switches with the help of EthernetChannel.
Few configuration restrictions can make a note that various interfaces cannot be merged in the EthernetChannel i.e., Fast Ethernet and Giga Ethernet links cannot be combined in a single channel (logical). The main purpose of EthernetChannel is to enlarge the speed capability of links on intermediate devices.
Link Aggregation: To avail a high bandwidth through a single path it joins or gathers physical ports to improve the connection reliability and sharing traffic load among the ports in the group.
Also, read…
Port Aggregation protocol: PAgP was marketed under or related to cisco systems It helps more than anything else in creating automation of EthernetChannel links, port aggregation protocol packets exchange between EthernetChannel ports, in order to form or establish the connection between the EthernetChannel. Intentionally we have some restrictions introduced in port aggregation protocol.
PAgP bundles all ports when it belongs to the same virtual local area network or desired trunk ports and it doesn’t accept which are configured on dynamic virtual local area network. If it gets already bundled and the modification arises that replicates to all ports in the bundle to make virtual lan same. For example, we need to change the speed and duplex to the port that makes a change on all ports in the bundle.
Link aggregation control protocol: LACP belongs to the IEEE standard, technically explains as 802.3 ads but newly it was explained as 802.1AX for the purpose of LAN and MAN. The functioning of Link aggregation protocol is similar to port aggregation protocol along with EthernetChannel because it applies to multiple owner environments and it works on cisco devices as well. One of the benefits in LACP is if the present working active link fails the standby or disaster recovery link will come into action.
Download What is Etherchannel in Cisco Switches and Routers in pdf – Click here