Bridge Group

csc010854800 · ‎12-14-2007

hi,

Can anybody tell where and how Bridge groups are used.

Should we use it for load balancing or redundancy between switch and router ????

shiva_ial · ‎12-14-2007

To bridge all nonrouted traffic among the network interfaces we use bridge group.

we bridge together two or more VLANs or routed ports, essentially connecting multiple VLANs within one bridge domain.

fall back brigding forwards traffic that the switch does not route and forwards traffic belonging to a nonroutable protocol such as DECnet.

i guess load balancing not possible

rgds

shiva

csc010854800 · ‎12-14-2007

Actually i want to connect 2 ports of layer 2 switches with 2 ethernet ports of router .

Can u tell me the config and the advantage behind it .

Can we use the same technique for connecting Layer 3 switches with routers to get redundancy.

Richard Burts · ‎12-14-2007

yogesh

Bridge groups operate at layer 2. So they are not very effective at connecting layer 3 switches and routers.

If you want to connect 2 ports of a layer 2 switch with 2 Ethernet interfaces of a router you can do that but the Ethernet interfaces on the router no longer operate as routed interfaces. Bridge group on the Ethernet interface makes the interface operate as a layer 2 entity and not as a layer 3 entity as it normally would. To use bridge group on the Ethernet interface you would configure IRB. In Integrated Routing and Bridging you configure a BVI interface which is a Bridge Virtual Interface. This virtual interface provides the layer 3 functionality (it gets an IP address while the physical interfaces do not get an IP address).

For information on IRB you can look at this link:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/tech/tk389/tk815/technologies_tech_note09186a0080094663.shtml

HTH

Rick

HTH

Rick