Fibre channel switch system

1. A Fibre Channel (FC) switch, comprising:

a chassis;

a first PHY converter that is housed in the chassis and that is coupled to a first port on the chassis, wherein FCoE formatted FC Well Known Addresses (WKAs) are registered in the first PHY converter as Ethernet bridging protocol addresses, and wherein the first PHY converter is configured to receive first FC protocol data traffic from an initiator system through the first port and convert the first FC protocol data traffic to first FC over Ethernet (FCoE) protocol data traffic;

an Ethernet switch chip that is housed in the chassis and that is coupled to the first PHY converter, wherein standard Ethernet bridging protocol addresses in a cache of the Ethernet switch chip have been replaced with FC routing entries, and wherein the Ethernet switch chip is configured to provide a protocol processing engine that is configured to receive the first FCoE protocol data traffic from the first converter and process the first FCoE protocol data traffic to provide second FCoE protocol data traffic for delivery to a target system; and

a second PHY converter that is housed in the chassis and that is coupled to the protocol processing engine and a second port on the chassis, wherein FCoE formatted FC Well Known Addresses (WKAs) are registered in the second PHY converter as Ethernet bridging protocol addresses, and wherein the second PHY converter is configured to receive the second FCoE protocol data traffic from the protocol processing engine, convert the second FCoE protocol data traffic to second FC protocol data traffic, and send the second FC protocol data traffic through the second port to the target system.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the conversion of the first FC protocol data traffic to the first FCoE protocol data traffic by the first PHY converter includes generating an FCoE source address for the initiator system from an FC source address for the initiator system that is included in the first FC protocol data traffic.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein the conversion of the first FC protocol data traffic to the first FCoE protocol data traffic by the first PHY converter includes generating an FCoE destination address for the target system from an FC destination address for the target system that is included in the first FC protocol data traffic.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein the standard Ethernet bridging protocol addresses are deregistered from the cache of the Ethernet switch chip.

5. The system of claim 1 , the Ethernet switch chip is configured such that broadcast data traffic, multicast data traffic, and unknown unicast data traffic are not forwarded.

6. An information handling system (IHS) network, comprising:

a server IHS that is configured to communicate using a Fibre Channel (FC) protocol;

a storage IHS that is configured to communicate using the FC protocol; and

a switch IHS coupled to the server IHS and the storage IHS, wherein the switch IHS includes:

a chassis;

a first PHY converter that is housed in the chassis, wherein FCoE formatted FC Well Known Addresses (WKAs) are registered in the first PHY converter as Ethernet bridging protocol addresses, and wherein the first PHY converter is configured to receive first FC protocol data traffic from the server IHS and convert the first FC protocol data traffic to first FC over Ethernet (FCoE) protocol data traffic;

an Ethernet switch chip that is coupled to the first PHY converter, wherein standard Ethernet bridging protocol addresses in a cache of the Ethernet switch chip have been replaced with FC routing entries, and wherein the Ethernet switch chip is configured to provide a protocol processing engine that is configured to receive the first FCoE protocol data traffic from the first converter and process the first FCoE protocol data traffic to provide second FCoE protocol data traffic for delivery to the storage IHS; and

a second PHY converter that is housed in the chassis and that is coupled to the protocol processing engine and the storage IHS, wherein FCoE formatted FC Well Known Addresses (WKAs) are registered in the second PHY converter as Ethernet bridging protocol addresses, and wherein the second PHY converter is configured to receive the second FCoE protocol data traffic from the protocol processing engine, convert the second FCoE protocol data traffic to second FC protocol data traffic, and send the second FC protocol data traffic to the storage IHS.

7. The IHS of claim 6 , wherein the conversion of the first FC protocol data traffic to the first FCoE protocol data traffic by the first PHY converter includes generating an FCoE source address for the server IHS from an FC source address for the server IHS that is included in the first FC protocol data traffic.

8. The IHS of claim 6 , wherein the conversion of the first FC protocol data traffic to the first FCoE protocol data traffic by the first PHY converter includes generating an FCoE destination address for the storage IHS from an FC destination address for the storage IHS that is included in the first FC data traffic.

9. The IHS of claim 6 , wherein the standard Ethernet bridging protocol addresses are deregistered from the cache of the Ethernet switch chip.

10. The IHS of claim 6 , wherein the Ethernet switch chip is configured such that broadcast data traffic, multicast data traffic, and unknown unicast data traffic are not forwarded.

11. A method for transmitting Fibre Channel (FC) protocol data traffic, comprising:

receiving, by a first PHY converter that is housed in a chassis and that includes FCoE formatted FC Well Known Addresses (WKAs) registered as Ethernet bridging protocol addresses, first FC protocol data traffic from a server IHS;

converting, by the first PHY converter, the first FC protocol data traffic to first FC over Ethernet (FCoE) protocol data traffic;

receiving, by a protocol processing engine that is provided by an Ethernet switch chip that is housed in the chassis and that includes a cache in which standard Ethernet bridging protocol addresses have been replaced with FC routing entries, the first FCoE protocol data traffic from the first PHY converter;

processing, by the protocol processing engine, the first FCoE protocol data traffic to provide second FCoE protocol data traffic for delivery to a storage IHS;

receiving, by a second PHY converter that is housed in the chassis and that includes FCoE formatted FC Well Known Addresses (WKAs) registered as Ethernet bridging protocol addresses, the second FCoE protocol data traffic from the protocol processing engine;

converting, by the second PHY converter, the second FCoE protocol data traffic to second FC protocol data traffic; and

sending, by the second PHY converter, the second FC protocol data traffic to the storage IHS.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the conversion of the first FC data traffic to the first FCoE protocol data traffic by the first PHY converter includes generating an FCoE source address for the server IHS from an FC source address for the server IHS that is included in the first FC protocol data traffic.

13. The method of claim 11 , wherein the conversion of the first FC protocol data traffic to the first FCoE protocol data traffic by the first PHY converter includes generating an FCoE destination address for the storage IHS from an FC destination address for the storage IHS that is included in the first FC protocol data traffic.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein the standard Ethernet bridging protocol addresses are deregistered from the cache of the Ethernet switch chip.

15. The method of claim 11 , wherein the Ethernet switch chip is configured such that broadcast data traffic, multicast data traffic, and unknown unicast data traffic are not forwarded.