Increasing NP4 offloading capacity using link aggregation groups (LAGs)

NP4 processors can offload sessions received by interfaces in link aggregation groups (LAGs) (IEEE 802.3ad). A LAG combines more than one physical interface into a group that functions like a single interface with a higher capacity than a single physical interface. For example, you could use a LAG if you want to offload sessions on a 3Gbps link by adding three 1Gbps interfaces to the same LAG.

All offloaded traffic types are supported by LAGs, including IPsec VPN traffic. Just like with normal interfaces, traffic accepted by a LAG is offloaded by the NP4 processor connected to the interfaces in the LAG that receive the traffic to be offloaded. If all interfaces in a LAG are connected to the same NP4 processor, traffic received by that LAG is offloaded by that NP4 processor. The amount of traffic that can be offloaded is limited by the capacity of the NP4 processor.

If a FortiGate has two or more NP4 processors connected by an integrated switch fabric (ISF), you can use LAGs to increase offloading by sharing the traffic load across multiple NP4 processors. You do this by adding physical interfaces connected to different NP4 processors to the same LAG.

Adding a second NP4 processor to a LAG effectively doubles the offloading capacity of the LAG. Adding a third further increases offloading. The actual increase in offloading capacity may not actually be doubled by adding a second NP4 or tripled by adding a thrid. Traffic and load conditions and other factors may limit the actual offloading result.

The increase in offloading capacity offered by LAGs and multiple NP4s is supported by the ISF that allows multiple NP4 processors to share session information. On models that have more than one NP4 and no ISF, if you attempt to add interfaces connected to different NP4 processors to a LAG the system displays an error message.

There are also a few limitations to LAG NP4 offloading support for IPsec VPN:

• IPsec VPN anti-replay protection cannot be used if IPSec is configured on a LAG that has interfaces connected to multiple NP4 processors.
• Using a LAG connected to multiple NP4 processors for decrypting incoming IPsec VPN traffic may cause some of the incoming traffic to be decrypted by the CPU. So this configuration is not recommended since not all decryption is offloaded. (Using a LAG connected to multiple NP4 processors for encrypting outgoing IPsec VPN traffic is supported with no limitations.)
• Because the encrypted traffic for one IPsec VPN tunnel has the same 5-tuple, the traffic from one tunnel can only can be balanced to one interface in a LAG. This limits the maximum throughput for one IPsec VPN tunnel in an NP4 LAG group to 1Gbps.

NP4 traffic shaping offloading

Accelerated Traffic shaping is supported with the following limitations.

• NP4 processors support policy-based traffic shaping. However, fast path traffic and traffic handled by the FortiGate CPU (slow path) are controlled separately, which means the policy setting on fast path does not consider the traffic on the slow path.
• The port based traffic policing as defined by the inbandwidth and outbandwidth CLI commands is not supported.
• DSCP configurations are supported.
• Per-IP traffic shaping is supported.
• QoS in general is not supported.

You can also use the traffic shaping features of the FortiGate unit’s main processing resources by disabling NP4 offloding. See Disabling NP offloading for firewall policies on page 1203.