Specifications

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Rev. 9.41 Module 5 – 135
Lesson 2 — RSTP and MSTP
Introduction
The original STP standard had some limitations. For example, convergence was slow,
requiring 30 to 50 seconds. In addition, STP was not VLAN aware, so without
careful planning, VLANs could potentially be isolated on an STP network.
Rapid Reconfiguration Spanning Tree Protocol (RSTP) addressed some of these
limitations, including reducing convergence time. RSTP superseded STP as the
standard in 1998.
Multiple Spanning Tree Protocol (MSTP) is an extension to STP and RSTP that makes
the protocol VLAN-aware. MSTP is backward compatible with both STP and RSTP.
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