It is common to find a fair part of a server's network bandwidth used for network backup and other service activities. If you can run the backup server on the same z/VM system and connect them all to vswitch, then all that network traffic can stay inside z/VM. If you used dedicated OSA devices, traffic would (at best) go out to the OSA and back in (double I/O) or worse, go out on the wire to the switch and get back.
Sharing network interfaces is like any sharing of resources. You take advantage of the fact that everyone uses small part of the total capacity. With large enough numbers and reasonable distribution, not everyone will want his share at the same time. And if they do (like network backup to an outboard server, you should not do them all at the same time). Rob -- Rob van der Heij Velocity Software, Inc http://velocitysoftware.com/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For LINUX-390 subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: INFO LINUX-390 or visit http://www.marist.edu/htbin/wlvindex?LINUX-390
