Configuring an LACP bonded Interface with Cisco switches We have received enough interest from our user community

about XenServer and net work configuration techniques that we felt it might be useful to provide some of the information we have assembled for all. Please forward all comments/correct ions to info@quorumsoft.com The default bonding mode for Citrix XenServer 5.5/5.6 is "1", or active-backup ( slb). This mode only provides fault tolerance, since only one NIC in the bond i s active at a time. For more heavily utilized production systems, an active-act ive configuration is preferable. The two bonding modes that provide full send/r eceive balancing across all NICs are 4 (802.3ad) and 6 (alb). Mode 4 provides l ink aggregation according to the 802.3ad specification, and requires an ethercha nnel to be configured on the switch. The following is an example of how to configure an LACP/802.3ad bond with XenSer ver 5.5 and a Cisco 3750 switch running IOS. First, configure your switchports for an LACP etherchannel. Note: in this case, we are making the etherchannel/Bond a trunk port which will only allow VLANs 2 - 11. We have two NICs from our XenServer that make up the bond0 interface, plu gged int Gi1/0/1 and Gi2/0/1. // Configure the EtherChannel first interface Port-channel1 description Etherchannel Team for XenServer1 switchport trunk encapsulation dot1q switchport trunk native vlan 2 switchport trunk allowed vlan 2-11 switchport mode trunk spanning-tree portfast spanning-tree bpduguard enable ! // now configure the individual switchports interface GigabitEthernet1/0/1 description XenServer1 - eth0 switchport trunk encapsulation dot1q switchport trunk native vlan 2 switchport trunk allowed vlan 2-11 switchport mode trunk speed 1000 duplex full channel-protocol lacp channel-group 2 mode active ! interface GigabitEthernet2/0/1 description XenServer1 - eth1 switchport trunk encapsulation dot1q switchport trunk native vlan 2 switchport trunk allowed vlan 2-11 switchport mode trunk speed 1000 duplex full channel-protocol lacp

channel-group 2 mode active ! // now make sure things are configured properly: show etherchannel 2 summary // this should output something like the following: ... Number of channel-groups in use: 4 Number of aggregators: 4 Group Port-channel Protocol Ports ------+-------------+-----------+----------------------------------------------2 Po2(SU) LACP Gi1/0/1(P) Gi2/0/1(P) // Note, you may see the two nics in (I) instead of (P) until you configure and reboot your XenServer

Now, make the following changes to your XenServer host. 1. Create a Bonded interface from XenCenter. Select your server, then the NICs tab and choose 'Create Bond'. Add the PIFs you want 2. The Citrix recommended option. Run the following command on the XenServer h ost console. Make sure to use the UUID of the Bonded interface. xe pif-param-set uuid= other-config:bond-mode=802.3ad (note: to find your PIF's uuid: xe pif-list host-uuid= ) (note: to find your Host's uuid: xe host-list ) 2a. Some of our users have reported problems getting the offical recommendation working, and suggested an alternate method: On the XenServer host, edit the following file: /opt/xensource/libexec/interface-reconfigure find the following line: "mode": "balance-slb", and replace it with "mode": "802.3ad", Then save and restart the XenServer. This will change the default bonding metho d for all Xen bonds to "802.3ad". 3. To make sure things are working as expected, run (replace X with your bond nu mber): cat /proc/net/bonding/bondX You should see something similar to this: Ethernet Channel Bonding Driver: v3.1.2 (January 20, 2007) Bonding Mode: IEEE 802.3ad Dynamic link aggregation Transmit Hash Policy: layer2 (0) MII Status: up MII Polling Interval (ms): 100 Up Delay (ms): 31000

Down Delay (ms): 200 802.3ad info LACP rate: slow Active Aggregator Info: Aggregator ID: 1 Number of ports: 2 Actor Key: 17 Partner Key: 2 Partner Mac Address: Slave Interface: eth0 MII Status: up Link Failure Count: 0 Permanent HW addr: Aggregator ID: 1 Slave Interface: eth1 MII Status: up Link Failure Count: 0 Permanent HW addr: Aggregator ID: 1 4. Test and verify. At this point, your new team should be up and functional. You can view this article online at: http://www.quorumsoft.com/kb/index.php/article/lacp-bond