System and method of a high buffered high bandwidth network element

A non-transitory machine-readable medium having executable instructions to cause one or more processing units to perform a method to queue a packet in a network element, the method comprising:

• receiving, with a packet storage unit, a packet from a packet switch unit via an interface coupling the packet storage chip and the packet switch unit;
• determining an external queue for the packet, wherein the external queue is associated with the packet storage unit;
• storing the packet in the external queue;
• and
• in response to detecting flow control information indicating packets may be sent from the external queue to the packet switch unit, forwarding the packet from the external queue to the packet switch unit.

A method to process a packet in a network element, the method comprising:

• receiving the packet, by a packet switch unit, wherein the packet was received by the network element on an ingress interface;
• determining if the packet is to be stored in an external queue;
• identifying an external queue for the packet based on one or more characteristics of the packet;
• forwarding the packet to a packet storage unit, wherein the packet storage unit includes storage for the external queue;
• receiving, with the packet switch unit, that packet from the packet storage unit;
• and
• forwarding the packet to an egress interface corresponding to the external queue.

A network element that processes a plurality of packets, the network element comprising:

• a plurality of network interfaces that communicate the plurality of packets;
• a data plane, coupled to the plurality of network interfaces, that process the plurality of packets, the data plane including:
• a plurality of external queues that stores at least one of the plurality of packets prior to this packet being transmitted by the network element;
• a packet storage unit, coupled to the plurality of external queues, that controls the storing of the at least one of the plurality of packets in the plurality of queues;
• and
• a packet switch unit, coupled to the packet storage unit, that, for each of the plurality of packets, receives that packet from a first network interface of the plurality of network interfaces, determines if that packet is to be stored in one of a plurality of external queues, identifies which of the plurality of external queues for that packet based on one or more characteristics of that packet, forwarding that packet to the packet storage unit, receiving that packet from the packet storage unit;
• and forwarding the packet to a second network interface of the plurality of network interfaces, wherein the network element transmits that packet with the second network interface.

A network element that processes a plurality of packets, the network element comprising:

• a plurality of network interfaces that communicate the plurality of packets;
• a data plane, coupled to the plurality of network interfaces, that processes the plurality of packets, the data plane including:
• a plurality of external queues that stores at least one of the plurality of packets prior to this packet being transmitted by the network element;
• a packet storage unit, coupled to the plurality of external queues, that controls the storing of the at least one of the plurality of packets in the plurality of queues;
• and
• a packet switch unit, coupled to the packet storage unit, that includes a plurality of internal queues, for each of the plurality of packets, receives that packet from a first network interface of the plurality of network interfaces, determines if that packet is to be stored in one of a plurality of external queues, wherein the packet switch unit further,
• if the packet is to be stored in the one of the plurality of external queues, forwards that packet to the packet storage unit, and receives that packet from the packet storage unit, and
• if the packet is not to be stored in the one of the plurality of external queues, stores the packet in one of the plurality of internal queues, and
• forwards the packet to a second network interface of the plurality of network interfaces, wherein the network element transmits that packet with the second network interface.

A non-transitory machine-readable medium having executable instructions to cause one or more processing units to perform a method to process a plurality of packets in a network element, the method comprising:

• receiving the plurality of packets, with a packet switch unit;
• determining an externally queued subset of packets from the plurality of packets that is to be stored in an external queue based on an ingress interface for each of the externally queued subset of packets;
• forwarding the externally queued subset of packets to a packet storage unit, wherein the packet storage unit includes storage for the external queue;
• receiving, with the packet switch unit, the externally queued subset of packets from the packet storage unit;
• forwarding the externally queued subset of packets to an egress interface corresponding to each of the externally queued subset of packets;
• storing an internally queued subset of packets from the plurality of packets in a queue that is internal to the packet switch unit;
• and
• forwarding the internally queued subset of packets to an egress interface corresponding to each of the internally queued subset of packets.