Rapid PVST+ – Cisco CCNP and CCIE

Rapid PVST+ provides for rapid recovery of connectivity following the failure of a network device, a switch port, or a LAN. It provides rapid convergence for edge ports. Rapid PVST+ is the IEEE 802.1w (RSTP) standard implemented per VLAN. A single instance of STP runs on each configured VLAN (if you do not manually disable STP). Each Rapid PVST+ instance on a VLAN has a single root switch. You can enable and disable STP on a per-VLAN basis when you are running Rapid PVST+.

Note

Rapid PVST+ is the default STP mode for Nexus switches.

Rapid PVST+ uses point-to-point wiring to provide rapid convergence of the spanning tree. The spanning tree reconfiguration can occur in less than one second with Rapid PVST+ (in contrast to 50 seconds with the default settings in the 802.1D STP).

Note

Rapid PVST+ supports one STP instance for each VLAN.

Using Rapid PVST+, STP convergence occurs rapidly. Each designated or root port in the STP sends out a BPDU every two seconds by default. On a designated or root port in the topology, if hello messages are missed three consecutive times, or if the maximum age expires, the port immediately flushes all protocol information in the table. A port considers that it loses connectivity to its direct neighbor root or designated port if it misses three BPDUs or if the maximum age expires. This rapid aging of the protocol information allows quick failure detection. The switch automatically checks the PVID.

Rapid PVST+ ports are connected through point-to-point links as follows:

Edge ports: When a port is configured as an edge port on an RSTP switch, the edge port immediately transitions to the forwarding state. You should configure only on ports that connect to a single end device as edge ports. Edge ports do not generate topology changes when the link changes.

Root ports: If Rapid PVST+ selects a new root port, it blocks the old root port and immediately transitions the new root port to the forwarding state.

 Point-to-point links: If a port is connected to another port through a point-to-point link and the local port becomes a designated port, it negotiates a rapid transition with the other port by using the proposal-agreement handshake to ensure a loop-free topology.

Rapid PVST+ achieves rapid transition to the forwarding state only on edge ports and point-to-point links. Although the link type is configurable, the system automatically derives the link type information from the duplex setting of the port. Full-duplex ports are assumed to be point-to-point ports, and half-duplex ports are assumed to be shared ports.

Edge ports do not generate topology changes, but all other designated and root ports generate a topology change (TC) BPDU when they either fail to receive three consecutive BPDUs from the directly connected neighbor or the maximum age times out. At this point, the designated or root port sends out a BPDU with the TC flag set. The BPDUs continue to set the TC flag as long as the TC While timer runs on that port. The value of the TC While timer is the value set for the hello time plus one second. The initial detector of the topology change immediately floods this information throughout the entire topology.

When Rapid PVST+ detects a topology change, the protocol does the following:

Starts the TC While timer with a value equal to twice the hello time for all the non-edge root and designated ports, if necessary.

Flushes the MAC addresses associated with all these ports.

The topology change notification floods quickly across the entire topology. The system flushes dynamic entries immediately on a per-port basis when it receives a topology change.