09-12-2012 08:33 AM - edited 03-07-2019 08:51 AM
Hi,
when using "show mls statistics" I see a lot packets are getting L3 Processed. Does that mean they are getting software-forwarded?
IOS is 12.2(33)SXI5.
Cat6k#show mls statistics
Statistics for Earl in Module 5
L2 Forwarding Engine
Total packets Switched : 46828375556247
L3 Forwarding Engine
Total packets Processed : 23360284229069 @ 1132343 pps
Total packets L3 Switched : 12958356175277 @ 599776 pps
regards,
Dirk
(Please rate if helpful)
09-12-2012 03:07 PM
Hi,
No, just because is layer-3 switched, it doesn't necessary mean software forwarding.
Policy Feature Card
• Layer 2 MAC address lookups into the Layer 2 CAM table.
• Looking into the packet headers to determine if this switching operation will be a Layer 2 or a Layer 3 operation. If it is going to be a Layer 3 operation, then it will hand off the packet to the Layer 3 engine for further processing.
The Layer 3 Engine is responsible for:
• NetFlow Statistics collection.
• Hardware based forwarding of IPv4, IPv6 and MPLS tagged packets
• QoS mechanism for ACL classification, marking of packets, and policing (rate limiting).
• Security mechanism for validating ACL rules against incoming packets.
• Maintaining Adjacency entries and statistics
• Maintaining Security ACL counters
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