cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 
cancel
1108
Views
0
Helpful
2
Replies

Multicast IGMP and PIM

shelley_wang
Level 1
Level 1

Hi,

I am studying multicast now. In order to better utilize my limited time, I am wondering which IGMP version is popular now in the industry? And which PIM is popular, PIM-DM, PIM-SM, or both?

thx,

Jingyi

1 Accepted Solution

Accepted Solutions

Peter Paluch
Cisco Employee
Cisco Employee

Hello Jingyi,

To my experience, the IGMPv2 and PIM-SM are the most often deployed versions. The IGMPv3 with its support of Source-Specific Multicast is internally more complex and while supported on all recent operating systems, the support for IGMPv3 on routers and switches is less than ideal. Also, most multicast applications are built as source-unspecific - for them, the IGMPv2 is ideal.

The PIM-SM is widely deployed because of its scalability. In fact, for IPv6, there is only the PIM-SM (and Bidir-PIM) available. The PIM-DM is fine for small networks and can be set up very quickly but in a large network with lots of routers, lots of multicast sources and lots of multicast groups, PIM-DM tends to consume relatively large system resources on routers (mostly as entries in multicast routing tables and state information). Also, the PIM-SM is better suited if multicast routing is performed between autonomous systems (the PIM-SM is used internally in both autonomous systems and the autonomous systems exchange information for multicast routing by MP-BGP and MSDP protocols).

So - IGMPv2 and PIM-SM.

Best regards,

Peter

View solution in original post

2 Replies 2

Peter Paluch
Cisco Employee
Cisco Employee

Hello Jingyi,

To my experience, the IGMPv2 and PIM-SM are the most often deployed versions. The IGMPv3 with its support of Source-Specific Multicast is internally more complex and while supported on all recent operating systems, the support for IGMPv3 on routers and switches is less than ideal. Also, most multicast applications are built as source-unspecific - for them, the IGMPv2 is ideal.

The PIM-SM is widely deployed because of its scalability. In fact, for IPv6, there is only the PIM-SM (and Bidir-PIM) available. The PIM-DM is fine for small networks and can be set up very quickly but in a large network with lots of routers, lots of multicast sources and lots of multicast groups, PIM-DM tends to consume relatively large system resources on routers (mostly as entries in multicast routing tables and state information). Also, the PIM-SM is better suited if multicast routing is performed between autonomous systems (the PIM-SM is used internally in both autonomous systems and the autonomous systems exchange information for multicast routing by MP-BGP and MSDP protocols).

So - IGMPv2 and PIM-SM.

Best regards,

Peter

Hi Peter,

Thanks for your very clear explanation.

Jingyi

Getting Started

Find answers to your questions by entering keywords or phrases in the Search bar above. New here? Use these resources to familiarize yourself with the community: