What is the difference between switch and switch fabric? Is it that in a switch, the host controls the transfers? And in fabric, even IO devices can takeover the control?

    Requires Free Membership to View

    Login

This is a great question because it is a confusing topic for many. In Fibre Channel parlance, a fabric is the entity that provides network services to end nodes. A fabric can be a single switch or it can be multiple switches that exchange information about the network and the nodes connected to it. All end nodes attached to a fabric, whether it is one or more switches, will get uniform responses to all queries, regardless of which switch they are connected to.

Regards,
Marc Farley

Editor's note: Do you agree with this expert's response? If you have more to share, post it in our Storage Networking discussion forum at http://searchstorage.discussions.techtarget.com/WebX?replyToMessage@7.uALMagHuauI^1@.ee83ce4!viewtype=convdate


This was first published in November 2001

Join the conversationComment

Share
Comments

    Results

    Contribute to the conversation

    All fields are required. Comments will appear at the bottom of the article.
    Back to top