Link Aggregation Control Protocol wiki

Link Aggregation Control Protocol[edit]

Within the IEEE specification, the Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP) provides a method to control the bundling of several physical ports together to form a single logical channel. LACP allows a network device to negotiate an automatic bundling of links by sending LACP packets to the peer (directly connected device that also implements LACP).

LACP Features and practical examples

1. Maximum number of bundled ports allowed in the port channel : Valid values are usually from 1 to 8.
2. LACP packets are sent with multicast group MAC address 01:80:c2:00:00:02 (01-80-c2-00-00-02)
3. During LACP detection period
   • LACP packets are transmitted every second
   • Keep alive mechanism for link member: (default: slow = 30s, fast=1s)
4. LACP can have the port-channel load-balance mode :
   • link (link-id) Integer that identifies the member link for load balancing. The range is from 1 to 8.
5. LACP mode :
   • active : Enables LACP unconditionally.
   • passive : Enables LACP only when an LACP device is detected. (This is the default state)