Operation Manual – MAC Address Table Management
H3C S3100 Series Ethernet Switches
Chapter 1 MAC Address Table
Management
1-1
Chapter 1 MAC Address Table Management
When configuring MAC address table management, go to these sections for
information you are interested in:
z Overview
z Configuring MAC Address Table Management
z Displaying MAC Address Table Information
z Configuration Example
 Note:
This chapter describes the management of static, dynamic, and blackhole MAC
address entries. For information about the management of multicast MAC address
entries, refer to the part related to multicast protocol.
1.1 Overview
1.1.1 Introduction to MAC Address Table
An Ethernet switch is mainly used to forward packets at the data link layer, that is,
transmit the packets to the corresponding ports according to the destination MAC
address of the packets. To forward packets quickly, a switch maintains a MAC address
table, which is a Layer 2 address table recording the MAC address-to-forwarding port
association. Each entry in a MAC address table contains the following fields:
z Destination MAC address
z ID of the VLAN which a port belongs to
z Forwarding egress port numbers on the local switch
When forwarding a packet, an Ethernet switch adopts one of the two forwarding
methods based upon the MAC address table entries.
z Unicast forwarding: If the destination MAC address carried in the packet is
included in a MAC address table entry, the switch forwards the packet through the
forwarding egress port in the entry.
z Broadcast forwarding: If the destination MAC address carried in the packet is not
included in the MAC address table, the switch broadcasts the packet to all ports
except the one receiving the packet.
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