Maximum EtherChannel Bandwidth of IE4000 Switch

[EE_36220]

Hi,

From the “Cisco Industrial Ethernet 4000, 4010 and 5000 Switch Software Configuration Guide”, “Chapter: How to Configure EtherChannels”,

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/switches/lan/cisco_ie4010/software/release/15-2_4_EC/configuration/guide/scg-ie4010_5000/swethchl.html

 it mentioned that:

“The EtherChannel provides full-duplex bandwidth up 2 Gb/s (Gigabit EtherChannel) between your switch and another switch or host. Each EtherChannel can consist of up to eight compatibly configured Ethernet ports.

The number of EtherChannels is limited to 10. For more information, see EtherChannel Configuration Guidelines.”

I am a bit confused about the '2Gb/s'; 'up to eight compatibly configured Ethernet ports' and 'The number of EtherChannels is limited to 10'.

As each IE4000 switch comes with 4 GE combo uplink ports, can I use the 4 GE combo uplink ports to establish a 4Gb/s connection between 2 IE4000 switchws?

Thanks,

[pieterh]

when any two endpoints are communicating over a link that have an etherchannel in its path, not all ports in the channel are used !!!!! only a single port of the etherchannel is used for communication between two MAC-adresses.  (there is lo load distribution over multiple channel-members)

so for this single port of the etherchannel there is 1Gbps Rx and 1Gbps Tx -> this is called 2 Gbps full-duplex (mind you only 1Gbs in the same direction).

for another set of endpoints (MAC adresses)  the data can be switched  using another port of the channel,

so the total throughput of the etherchannel CAN be more than 2Gbps ful-duplex if you have multiple data streams using multiple endpoints, but not between the same two endpoints.
So YES, between two switches 4Gbps total throughput is possible, but (see above) NOT between the same two MAC adresses.

you can also use other ports for an etherchannel not only the 4 combo ports

- max 8 ports per etherchannel  (e.g. 2 channels each 8 ports)

- max 10 etherchannels (e.g. 2 ports per channel)

seems straghtforward ?

[EE_36220]

Thanks Pieterh for the explanations,

Would like to clarify my understandings:

"The EtherChannel provides full-duplex bandwidth up 2 Gb/s (Gigabit EtherChannel) between your switch and another switch or host." <<  This means the max. bandwidth for each physical Ethernet port belonged to an EtherChannel.

"Each EtherChannel can consist of up to eight compatibly configured Ethernet ports."  << I can setup an EtherChannel consists of 8 GE ports.

"The number of EtherChannels is limited to 10." << I can setup a max. of 10 EtherChannels (each consists of up to 8 GE ports) to 10 different switches.

Lastly, am I right to say that between 2 IE4000 switches, I can setup an EtherChannel consists of 8 GE ports to form a link with 16Gbps full-duplex (8Gbps Rx & 8Gbps Tx) throughput.

Thanks!