Configure an Aggregate Interface Group
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Configure an Aggregate Interface Group

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Configure an Aggregate Interface Group

An aggregate interface group uses IEEE 802.1AX link aggregation to combine multiple Ethernet interfaces into a single virtual interface that connects the firewall to another network device or firewall. An aggregate group increases the bandwidth between peers by load balancing traffic across the combined interfaces. It also provides redundancy; when one interface fails, the remaining interfaces continue supporting traffic.
By default, interface failure detection is automatic only at the physical layer between directly connected peers. However, if you enable Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP), failure detection is automatic at the physical and data link layers regardless of whether the peers are directly connected. LACP also enables automatic failover to standby interfaces if you configured hot spares. All Palo Alto Networks
®
firewalls except VM-Series models support aggregate groups. The Product Selection tool indicates the number of aggregate groups each firewall supports. Each aggregate group can have up to eight interfaces.
PAN-OS
®
firewall models support a maximum of 16,000 IP addresses assigned to physical or virtual Layer 3 interfaces; this maximum includes both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.
QoS is supported on only the first eight aggregate groups.
Before configuring an aggregate group, you must configure its interfaces. Among the interfaces assigned to any particular aggregate group, the hardware media can differ (for example, you can mix fiber optic and copper), but the bandwidth and interface type must be the same. The bandwidth and interface type options are:
  • Bandwidth
    —1Gbps, 10Gbps, 25Gbps, 40Gbps, or 100Gbps.
  • Interface type
    —HA3, virtual wire, Layer 2, or Layer 3.
This procedure describes configuration steps only for the Palo Alto Networks firewall. You must also configure the aggregate group on the peer device. Refer to the documentation of that device for instructions.
  1. Configure the general interface group parameters.
    1. Select
      Network
      Interfaces
      Ethernet
      and
      Add Aggregate Group
      .
    2. In the field adjacent to the read-only
      Interface Name
      , enter a number to identify the aggregate group. The range is 1 to the maximum number of aggregate interface groups supported by the firewall.
    3. For the
      Interface Type
      , select
      HA
      ,
      Virtual Wire
      ,
      Layer2
      , or
      Layer3
      .
    4. Configure the remaining parameters for the
      Interface Type
      you selected.
  2. Configure the LACP settings.
    Perform this step only if you want to enable LACP for the aggregate group.
    You cannot enable LACP for virtual wire interfaces.
    1. Select the
      LACP
      tab and
      Enable LACP
      .
    2. Set the
      Mode
      for LACP status queries to
      Passive
      (the firewall just responds—the default) or
      Active
      (the firewall queries peer devices).
      As a best practice, set one LACP peer to active and the other to passive. LACP cannot function if both peers are passive. The firewall cannot detect the mode of its peer device.
    3. Set the
      Transmission Rate
      for LACP query and response exchanges to
      Slow
      (every 30 seconds—the default) or
      Fast
      (every second). Base your selection on how much LACP processing your network supports and how quickly LACP peers must detect and resolve interface failures.
    4. Select
      Fast Failover
      if you want to enable failover to a standby interface in less than one second. By default, the option is disabled and the firewall uses the IEEE 802.1ax standard for failover processing, which takes at least three seconds.
      As a best practice, use
      Fast Failover
      in deployments where you might lose critical data during the standard failover interval.
    5. Enter the
      Max Ports
      (number of interfaces) that are active (1 to 8) in the aggregate group. If the number of interfaces you assign to the group exceeds the
      Max Ports
      , the remaining interfaces will be in standby mode. The firewall uses the
      LACP Port Priority
      of each interface you assign (Step 3) to determine which interfaces are initially active and to determine the order in which standby interfaces become active upon failover. If the LACP peers have non-matching port priority values, the values of the peer with the lower
      System Priority
      number (default is 32,768; range is 1 to 65,535) will override the other peer.
    6. (
      Optional
      ) For active/passive firewalls only, select
      Enable in HA Passive State
      if you want to enable LACP pre-negotiation for the passive firewall. LACP pre-negotiation enables quicker failover to the passive firewall (for details, see LACP and LLDP Pre-Negotiation for Active/Passive HA).
      If you select this option, you cannot select
      Same System MAC Address for Active-Passive HA
      ; pre-negotiation requires unique interface MAC addresses on each HA firewall.
    7. (
      Optional
      ) For active/passive firewalls only, select
      Same System MAC Address for Active-Passive HA
      and specify a single
      MAC Address
      for both HA firewalls. This option minimizes failover latency if the LACP peers are virtualized (appearing to the network as a single device). By default, the option is disabled: each firewall in an HA pair has a unique MAC address.
      If the LACP peers are not virtualized, use unique MAC addresses to minimize failover latency.
  3. Click
    OK
    .
  4. Assign interfaces to the aggregate group.
    Perform the following steps for each interface (1–8) that will be a member of the aggregate group.
    1. Select
      Network
      Interfaces
      Ethernet
      and click the interface name to edit it.
    2. Set the
      Interface Type
      to
      Aggregate Ethernet
      .
    3. Select the
      Aggregate Group
      you just defined.
    4. Select the
      Link Speed
      ,
      Link Duplex
      , and
      Link State
      .
      As a best practice, set the same link speed and duplex values for every interface in the group. For non-matching values, the firewall defaults to the higher speed and full duplex.
    5. (
      Optional
      ) Enter an
      LACP Port Priority
      (default is 32,768; range is 1 to 65,535) if you enabled LACP for the aggregate group. If the number of interfaces you assign exceeds the
      Max Ports
      value of the group, the port priorities determine which interfaces are active or standby. The interfaces with the lower numeric values (higher priorities) will be active.
    6. Click
      OK
      .
  5. If the firewalls have an active/active configuration and you are aggregating HA3 interfaces, enable packet forwarding for the aggregate group.
    1. Select
      Device
      High Availability
      Active/Active Config
      and edit the Packet Forwarding section.
    2. Select the aggregate group you configured for the
      HA3 Interface
      and click
      OK
      .
  6. Commit
    your changes.
  7. Verify the aggregate group status.
    1. Select
      Network
      Interfaces
      Ethernet
      .
    2. Verify that the Link State column displays a green icon for the aggregate group, indicating that all member interfaces are up. If the icon is yellow, at least one member is down but not all. If the icon is red, all members are down.
    3. If you configured LACP, verify that the Features column displays the LACP enabled icon for the aggregate group.
  8. (
    PA-7050 and PA-7080 firewalls only
    ) If you have an aggregate interface group that has interfaces located on different line cards, it is a best practice to enable the firewall so that it can handle fragmented IP packets it receives on multiple interfaces of the AE group that are spread over multiple cards. To do so, use the following CLI operational command with the
    hash
    keyword. (The other two keywords are also shown for completeness.)
    1. Use the following operational CLI command:
      set ae-frag redistribution-policy
      <
      self
      |
      fixed sXdpX
      |
      hash
      >
      • self
        —(default) This keyword is for legacy behavior; it does not enable the firewall to handle fragmented packets received on multiple interfaces of an AE interface group.
      • fixed
        s
        <
        slot-number
        >
        dp
        <
        dataplane-cpu-number
        >—Replace the
        slot-number
        variable and replace the
        data-plane-cpu-number
        variable with the dataplane number of the dataplane that will handle all IP fragments received by all members of all AE interfaces. The
        fixed
        keyword is intended mainly for troubleshooting purposes and shouldn’t be used in production.
      • hash
        —Use to enable the firewall to handle fragmented packets it receives on multiple interfaces of an AE interface group that are located on more than one line card.

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