Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series Administration Guide

CHAPTER
35-1
Software Configuration Guide—Release IOS XE 3.5.0E and IOS 15.2(1)E
OL_28731-01
35
Configuring Cisco Express Forwarding
This chapter describes Cisco Express Forwarding (CEF) on the Catalyst 4500 series switch. It also
provides guidelines, procedures, and examples to configure this feature.
This chapter includes the following major sections:
• About CEF, page 35-1
• Catalyst 4500 Series Switch Implementation of CEF, page 35-3
• CEF Configuration Restrictions, page 35-6
• Configuring CEF, page 35-6
• Monitoring and Maintaining CEF, page 35-8
Note For complete syntax and usage information for the switch commands used in this chapter, see the Cisco
Catalyst 4500 Series Switch Command Reference and related publications at this location:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps4324/index.html
If a command is not in the Catalyst 4500 Series Switch Command Reference, you can locate it in the
Cisco IOS library. See the Cisco IOS Command Reference and related publications at this location:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps6350/index.html
About CEF
This section contains information on the two primary components that comprise the CEF operation:
• CEF Features, page 35-1
• Forwarding Information Base, page 35-2
• Adjacency Tables, page 35-2
CEF Features
CEF is advanced Layer 3 IP switching technology that optimizes performance and scalability for large
networks with dynamic traffic patterns or networks with intensive web-based applications and
interactive sessions.

Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series Specifications

General

Series	Catalyst 4500 Series
Category	Switch
Layer Support	Layer 2, Layer 3
Form Factor	Modular chassis
Stackable	No
Chassis Slots	3, 6, 7, 10
Power Supply Options	AC, DC
Redundancy	Power supply, Supervisor engine
Network Management	Cisco IOS Software CLI, SNMP, Cisco Prime Infrastructure
Features	Security, QoS
Port Density	Up to 384 ports per chassis
Security Features	802.1X, ACLs, DHCP Snooping, Dynamic ARP Inspection, IP Source Guard
Supervisor Engine	8-E