> # NPV Traffic Management Guidelines

> When deploying NPV traffic management, follow these guidelines:

> - Use NPV traffic management only when the automatic traffic engineering by the NPV device is not sufficient for the network requirements.
> - Do not configure traffic maps for all the servers. For non-configured servers, NPV will use automatic traffic engineering.
> - Configure the Persistent FC ID on the core switch. Traffic engineering directs the associated server interface to external interfaces that lead to the same core switch. The server will be assigned the same FC ID for every log in. This guideline is not applicable if a 91x4 switch is used as the core switch.
> - Server interfaces configured to a set of external interfaces cannot use any other available external interfaces, even if the configured interfaces are not available.
> - Do not configure disruptive load balancing because this involves moving a device from one external interface to another interface. Moving the device between external interfaces requires NPV relogin to the core switch through F port leading to traffic disruption.
> - Link a set of servers to a core switch by configuring the server to a set of external interfaces that are linked to the core switch.

> Copyright 2010-2015, Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.