Using Linked Product Regions › INMC Link Planning › Preferential Mode Multipath Links

Preferential Mode Multipath Links

A preferential link definition defines from two to eight sessions for a remote region, where each session is allocated a traffic weighting. Data is sent, by preference, on the first session. If the first session is busy, then data is sent on the second session unless that is busy too, and so on.

You can select the traffic level at which a session becomes busy and causes an overflow to the next session. You can also specify the number of unresponded chains of data that can be outstanding on a given session at any one time.

A preferential link is best suited to the following circumstances:

• You want to direct as much traffic as possible across a particular network path to reduce its impact on traffic flowing on other network paths. Overflow onto a second network path is allowed only if the volume of traffic exceeds a certain threshold.
• Traffic can be directed to lightly loaded network routes such as those used as backup links.
• Additional bandwidth can be borrowed from time to time from other network paths if the preferred path becomes congested.