Switched fabric
SAN Recovery - Switched fabric
Switched fabric, also known as switching fabric or fabric switch, is a network topology which enables data movement from one network node to the other via network switches. These nodes constitute the ‘fabric’ in the switched fabric. The node connections are temporary, and they can be reconfigured, in other words, they can be ‘switched.’
Switched fabric is a combination of hardware and software. It includes switching units in a node, their integrated circuits and the programming that allows switching paths to be controlled. Switches are cascaded together to form a fabric network.
Switched fabric includes data buffers and uses shared memory. This technology is popularly used in telecommunication, Fibre Channel storage area networks (SANs) and other high-speed networks such as InfiniBand. In Signal Computing System Architecture (SCSA), part of the hardware model includes a switch fabric controller. Other popular applications of the technology include asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) and frame relay, which are mainly used in fault tolerance applications.
Fibre Channel Switched Fabric
Fibre Channel Switched Fabric (FC-SW) devices are connected to each other via Fibre Channel switches. This topology allows connections up to a theoretical maximum of 16 million devices. FC-SW is the most flexible among the three FC topologies, but it is the most expensive because it requires costly Fibre Channel switch.
Switched fabric topology gains significance mainly because it is capable of failover. In case there is a problem with one switch or a link, datagram can use another fabric to take over the function.
