Arbitrated Loops

An arbitrated loop is made up of a series of nodes connected into a ring. Often a hub is used to organize the cabling.

Like a Token Ring, inactive nodes in an arbitrated loop are bypassed, and a node must perform an insertion process in order to join the loop.

A loop sometimes is built into the backplane of a disk enclosure or some other device chassis. The units that are slotted into the enclosure become active nodes on the loop.

There is an important benefit of the arbitrated loop structure. When a loop is used to link disk units together, connectivity to all remaining disk units is preserved when one or more disk units are removed.

A private (standalone) arbitrated loop can have up to 126 active node ports (NL_Ports). ...

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