Understanding and Configuring Port Mirroring

The port mirroring feature enables you to gain visibility into the traffic flowing through a network and assist in troubleshooting connectivity issues and monitoring the performance of network devices. By using the port mirroring feature, Netvisor ONE  copies traffic from specific ports on a switch to other ports on the same switch or a different switch.

To analyze the traffic, you must configure a destination port for the mirrored traffic where the network analyzer tools are connected. For example, when an application needs access to data flowing through the switch, but does not want to impede the flow, the port mirroring feature can provide the configuration required by this application.

Netvisor ONE supports the following port mirroring functionalities:

• Local Switched Port Analyzer (SPAN) mode: This is a  simple port mirroring configuration, which copies traffic from one or more source ports to one or more destination ports on the same switch.

• Remote Switched Port Analyzer (RSPAN) mode: An extension of SPAN,  which copies packets from and between  different switches by using a user-specified VLAN to carry the traffic. This feature enables remote monitoring of multiple switches.