A device described herein may include an input port operable to receive
data packets; a switching board operable to classify the data packets,
determine whether the data packets should be accepted by the device, and
determine whether received data packets are first data packets in a
session; a management board operable to receive the data packets from the
switching board that were determined by the switching board to be the
first data packets in a session; and one or more processing boards
operable to receive data packets from the switching board that were
determined by the switching board to not be the first data packets in a
session and to process the received data packets.