ECO–ALOC: Energy-efficient resource allocation for cluster-based software routers

In this paper, we explore the use of cluster-based software routers as a way to share hardware resources, reduce costs, and save energy. We propose ECO–ALOC, an energy-efficient resource allocation mechanism that reconfigures the router according to the traffic demands using two modules. The first module provides fine-grained energy consumption control by switching CPU operation frequencies among three special frequencies. The second module provides long-term power savings by using virtual router migration to consolidate the load and shut idle servers down. We simulate a cluster-based software router using real traffic traces to evaluate our proposal. Results show that ECO–ALOC provides power savings of up to 93% depending on the cluster load scenario.