Operation of Fast Switching
Fast switching uses a fast cache maintained in a router’s data plane. The fast cache contains information about how traffic from different data flows should be forwarded. As seen in Figure 11-2, the first packet in a data flow is process switched by a router’s CPU. After the router determines how to forward the first frame of a data flow, the forwarding information is stored in the fast cache. Subsequent packets in that same data flow are forwarded based on information in the fast cache, as opposed to being process switched. As a result, fast switching dramatically reduces a router’s CPU utilization, as compared to process switching.
Figure 11-2 Data Flow with Fast Switching
Fast switching can be configured in ...
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