Partitioned backplane slot to couple switch fabric blades to port blades
AssigneeIntel Corporation
InventorSoeren R. F. Laursen
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A network switch having a plurality of port blades, each port blade having a media port and an input and an output connection. The network switch includes a slot adapted to receive a first switch fabric blade in one of a plurality of positions. The first switch fabric blade is configured to receive a subset of the input connections and output connections from the port blades. Multiple switch fabric blades can be inserted into the slot to receive a different subset of the connections. In this manner, a low-cost modular network switch can be designed that can easily be scaled as bandwidth requirements increase.
Claims8
A method comprising:
- partitioning a slot in a backplane of an information handling device into multiple locations;
- receiving into at least one of the partitioned locations of the slot a switch fabric blade;
- and
- receiving into another slot in the backplane a port blade, the port blade having at most a subset of inputs and outputs communicatively coupled with the switch fabric blade via point-to-point connections in the backplane.
An information handling device comprising:
- a backplane including point-to-point connections;
- a slot within the backplane to receive a port blade, the port blade having a plurality of input and output connections;
- and
- another slot within the backplane, the other slot partitioned into multiple regions to receive and couple a switch fabric blade in communication with at most a subset of the input and output connections of a received port blade via a portion of the point-to-point connections in the backplane.
An information handling device comprising:
- a plurality of slots, each to receive input and output connections of a port blade;
- a switch fabric slot to receive a switch fabric blade in one of multiple regions of the switch fabric slot;
- and
- a backplane including point-to-point connections to interconnect pins in the multiple regions of the switch fabric slot to input and output connections of a port blade received and coupled to one of the plurality of slots.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.