Patent ID: 7369562

Claim:
A telecommunications node with an ability to handle IP-traffic and to terminate telecommunications traffic, the node comprising: a backplane, which is able to switch IP-packets; at least two device boards, which are connected to the backplane and are associated with the handling of IP-traffic; at least one resource for processing telecommunications traffic, a resource manager; and a distributed forwarding engine functionality, wherein the forwarding engine functionality is distributed such that each of said at least two device boards is provided with a forwarding engine, wherein at least a first device board of said at least two device boards is further provided with at least a first resource of the at least one resource and at least one board internal IP-subnet, having an associated IP subnet address and at least a first associated IP interface address, wherein the first associated IP interface address is based on said associated IP subnet address, wherein the board internal IP-subnet is associated with the at least one resource, and wherein the resource manager is arranged to perform a load distribution within the node by determining that a destination address of a first telecommunications traffic stream is to be based on the IP subnet address associated with the board internal IP-subnet.