Leaf and Spine Network Architecture in PowerScale

Leaf and Spine Network Architecture is used for Backend in PowerScale / Isilon for node to node communication.

A Leaf and Spine network Architecture is highly scalable and redundant.

In a Leaf-spine network switch architecture.

The access layer of the network is referred to as the leaf layer.

The PowerScale nodes connect to leaf switches at this layer.

At the next level, the aggregation and core network layers are condensed into a single spine layer.

Every leaf switch connects to every spine switch to ensure that all leaf switches are no
more than one hop away from one another.

Leaf to Spine connections must be evenly distributed.

Various Leaf and Spine switches used in PowerScale backend configuration.

S5232 switch as leaf and spine
Z9100 switch as leaf and spine
Z9264 switch as leaf and spine
Z9264 switch as spine and Z9100 or S5232 as leaf
The information presented is only for one side of the back-end network.
Because the back-end consists of two similar networks, the configuration will need to be duplicated for the redundant back-end path.