On 3 Feb 2014, at 11:17, Nick Hilliard <n...@foobar.org> wrote: > On 03/02/2014 11:11, Sam Wilson wrote: >> Let me de-lurk and make the obvious point that using standard Ethernet >> addressing would limit the number of nodes on a single link to 2^47, and >> that would require every unicast address assigned to every possible >> vendor. Using just the Locally Administered addresses would limit you >> to 2^46. > > it bothers me that I can't find any switch with 2^46 ports. > > Damned vendors.
The back of my envelope says that with my vendor of choice and a 4-deep tree (7-hop old-style STP limit) of 384-port switches I can't get more than about 2^34 edge ports. Very disappointing. That would need approximately 57 million routers, though, and 170 GW of electrical power, not counting the cooling requirements. -- Sam Wilson Communications Infrastructure Section, IT Infrastructure Information Services, The University of Edinburgh Edinburgh, Scotland, UK The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in Scotland, with registration number SC005336.
