You are installing two Brocade DCXs in a cascaded fabric with four ISLs at 8 Gbps. Which statement describes how to achieve maximum throughput?

Anjali D.Dec 6, 2025

Good discussion everyone, wanted to add some context on why B is the right call here. When you have four ISLs connecting two Brocade DCX switches, combining them into a single trunk group gives you frame-based trunking, which aggregates all four links into one logical pipe and lets you use the full combined bandwidth of 32 Gbps. Frame-based trunking also does a much better job of load-balancing individual frames across all four ISLs, so you actually approach that theoretical max instead of leaving bandwidth stranded on underused links. Port-based routing in option A only picks one path per flow and does not balance nearly as efficiently, and disabling trunking entirely as in C or D throws away the aggregation benefit altogether. So B is your answer if maximum throughput is the goal.

Dervla O.Jun 1, 2026

B is your answer. Frame-based trunking groups all four ISLs into a single logical pipe and distributes frames across them in round-robin fashion, which saturates the full 32 Gbps aggregate bandwidth in a way that port-based routing and DPS simply cannot match because those methods tie a whole exchange to one physical link.

Carlos M.Jun 9, 2026

I went with A first because Open Trunking sounded like it would spread traffic across all four ISLs and I figured more paths meant more throughput. What tripped me up is that port-based routing assigns flows based on source/destination port pairs, so you can end up with some ISLs doing all the work while others sit mostly idle depending on the traffic mix. Frame-based trunking in B puts all four ISLs into a single trunk group and distributes individual frames across every link, which is what actually lets you hit that full 4x8 Gbps aggregate. The trunk group is the key phrase here, because without it you just have four separate 8 Gbps paths with no coordination, not one 32 Gbps logical pipe.

Toby R.Jun 17, 2026

B is correct, and the exam tested this exact concept. Frame-based trunking lets the fabric distribute individual frames across all four ISLs in the trunk group, so you actually get all 32 Gbps of aggregate bandwidth in play rather than being bottlenecked by a single pipe. A was the one that tripped people up in my testing group because Open Trunking sounds like more flexibility, but port-based routing means any given source-destination port pair is pinned to one ISL, so you never actually use all four simultaneously for a single flow the way frame-based does. C throwing out trunking entirely just gives you four independent 8 Gbps links with no aggregation, and D mixing aptpolicy with DLS is a real config knob but it is not the mechanism for maximizing throughput across a trunk. Go with B.

Mateus R.Dec 28, 2025

Frame-based trunking is like bundling four garden hoses into one fat pipe where the water (frames) flows in order but spreads across all four at once, giving you the full 32 Gbps combined. One trunk group with all four ISLs is exactly right because Brocade's DPS-based trunking keeps frames in sequence while load-balancing across every link in the group, which is what actually saturates that inter-switch bandwidth.

Lena V.Dec 14, 2025

I kept reading "maximum throughput" and thinking port-based routing with Open Trunking (A) was the play, since Open Trunking lets you span trunk groups across port groups. What nailed it for me was remembering that frame-based trunking on Brocade combines all four ISLs into a single logical pipe so you get the full 32 Gbps aggregated, whereas Open Trunking still splits traffic across separate groups and you lose that unified bandwidth.

Orla P.Jun 24, 2026

Port-based routing in A is the trap, answer is B.