Load sharing in MPLS/VPN networks with route reflectors

Some of the e-mails and comments I received after writing the “Changing VPNv4 route attributespost illustrated common MPLS/VPN misconceptions, so it’s worth addressing them in a series of posts. Let’s start with the simplest scenario: load balancingsharing toward a multi-homed customer site. We’ll use a very simple MPLS/VPN network with three customer sites, four CE-routers, four PE-routers a route reflector:

Let’s assume that we use the default MPLS/VPN RT/RD design rules: one RD and one import/export RT per simple VPN. The IPv6 (or IPv4) default routes received by PE-A and PE-B are transformed into VPNv6 (or VPNv4) routes ([RD]::/0 or RD:0.0.0.0/0) and sent to RR.

RR receives two identical VPNv6 (or VPNv4) routes from two sources (PE-A and PE-B), installs both of them in its BGP table, selects the best one and sends the best one to the other BGP neighbors. PE-C and PE-D thus receive only a single default route and forward all traffic toward PE-A or PE-B (based on the decision BGP made on RR). There is absolutely no way to change the RR behavior – it’s one of those BGP rules that nobody wanted to touch (yet): only the best routes in the BGP table are propagated to BGP neighbors.

The above statement is not entirely correct – the BGP Best External feature is violating that rule and advertising best external route even when better internal route exists.

To enable PE-C and PE-D to forward traffic toward PE-A and PE-B, you have to make the two default routes somehow different. The only trick that works is changing the RD on one of them:

  • PE-A advertises the default route received from CE-A as [RD1]::/0 (or RD1:0.0.0.0/0)
  • PE-B advertises the default route received from CE-B as [RD2]::/0 (or RD2:0.0.0.0/0)
  • RR receives two different routes (within the VPNv6 address family, [RD1]::/0 and [RD2]::/0 are different routes) and propagates both of them to PE-C and PE-D.
  • PE-C and PE-D receive both routes and import both of them into the same VRF (remember: imports are based on RT, not RD) , enabling true load sharing toward PE-A and PE-B.

You have to configure BGP load sharing with the maximum-paths ibgp number router configuration command within the IPv4 VRF address family on PE-C and PE-D, otherwise they will not insert more than one BGP route into the VRF IP routing table (even though two routes are present in the BGP table).

More information

If you’re considering MPLS/VPN deployment in your enterprise network, watch the Enterprise MPLS/VPN Deployment webinar.

15 comments:

  1. Hopefully we'll see some BGP Add-Path implemented in more "real production" deployments along with PIC :) It's been a while since they have been kicking it down the IETF hallways...
  2. in case you need to load share using bgp multipath, see
    http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/ios/12_2t/12_2t11/feature/guide/ft11bmpl.html
    or, Ivan, is it load balancing? :-E
    http://puck.nether.net/pipermail/cisco-nsp/2006-November/036134.html
    please, enlighten us, I hate to speak with impreciseness :)
  3. Yes using different RDs to advertise unique VPNv4 prefixes through RR
    http://blog.shafagh.com/2010/09/05/bgp-multipath-part-two/
  4. I meant actually this one! ;)
    http://blog.shafagh.com/2010/09/07/bgp-multipath-part-three/
  5. Who am I to go against the community-agreed terminology ;) Changed the heading and the text (thank you!).

    Also, you HAVE TO enable IBGP multipath on PE-C and PE-D, otherwise they will not install additional BGP routes into the VRF routing table. Somehow I had the feeling it wasn't needed, but a quick lab test proved otherwise.
  6. Thanks for the links!
  7. FYI, it still says "load balancing" in the RSS title
  8. That takes a while ... Eventually it gets fixed 8-) Ah, the beauties of mashups :-P
  9. Precisely. You read my thoughts 8-)
    I hope I get green light to implement it in a production network (2 8M IMA bundles)...
  10. Precisely. You read my thoughts 8-)
    I hope I get green light to implement it in a production network (2 8M IMA bundles)...
  11. What would happen, if the CE routers in the multihomed site advertises the prefixes with two different metric values ( i.e CE1 = 150, CE2 = 250 )? . Will the RR can have two entries ?/
    Replies
    1. Yes, because the RDs are different, so these two routes look like totally different VPNv4 prefixes.
  12. Hi Ivan, I did a simple lab and looks with route reflector it did not work with different metric values. May be I did something wrong?
    Replies
    1. Keep in mind that without add-path the route reflector selects a single route and propagates its best route to its clients.
  13. thank you Ivan. Without any metric I can see two routes but when I add the metric from second CPE the routes are gone in RR. I have added add-path in RR. I am definitely doing something wrong...

    address-family vpnv4
    bgp additional-paths install

    I have two RR in a cluster. Without metric I can see both prefix.

    Network Next Hop Metric LocPrf Weight Path
    Route Distinguisher: 100:100
    *>i 172.16.20.4/30 10.0.0.2 0 100 0 ?
    *>i 192.168.1.1/32 10.0.0.2 0 100 0 65506 i
    Route Distinguisher: 100:102
    *>i 172.16.20.0/30 10.0.0.1 0 100 0 ?
    *>i 192.168.1.1/32 10.0.0.1 0 100 0 65506 i
    Route Distinguisher: 100:103
    *>i 172.16.20.76/30 10.0.0.5 0 100 0 ?
    *>i 192.168.1.3/32 10.0.0.5 0 100 0 65506 i



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