Patent ID: 8897315

Claim:
A network switch device, comprising: a plurality of ingress processors, each ingress processor having (i) a plurality of ingress ports, and (ii) a packet memory to store packets received via the plurality of ingress ports; a plurality of egress processors, each egress processor having a plurality of egress ports; a switch fabric configured to communicatively couple the plurality of ingress processors to the plurality of egress processors; wherein each ingress processor is configured to: create descriptors for packets received via ingress ports, each descriptor having a smaller size than the corresponding packet, store the packets in the packet memory, process each descriptor to determine at least the appropriate egress processor among the egress processors to which to forward the descriptor, transmit, via the switch fabric, descriptors to egress processors, and in response to receiving PULL messages from the egress processors, transmit packets to the egress processors via the switch fabric.