User guide

E
XTREME
W
ARE
S
OFTWARE
U
SER
G
UIDE
10-1
10
Extreme Standby Router Protocol
This chapter covers the following topics:
• Overview on page 10-1
• ESRP Basics on page 10-2
• Determining the ESRP Master on page 10-3
• Grouping Blocks of 10/100 Ports on page 10-7
• ESRP Options on page 10-9
• ESRP and VLAN aggregation on page 10-13
• ESRP Commands on page 10-14
• Displaying ESRP Information on page 10-20
O
VERVIEW
ESRP is a feature of ExtremeWare that allows multiple switches to provide redundant
routing services to users. From the workstation’s perspective, there is only one default
router (that has one IP address and one MAC address), so ARP cache entries in client
workstations do not need to be refreshed or aged-out.
In addition to providing layer 3 routing redundancy for IP and IPX, ESRP also provides
for layer 2 redundancy. These “layered” redundancy features can be used in
combination or independently. You do not have to configure the switch for routing to
make valuable use of ESRP. The layer 2 redundancy features of ESRP offer fast failure
recovery and provide for dual-homed system design. In some instances, depending on