5k nexus switch and 2k FEX

[romanroma]

I am new to the Nexus switch line; however, I am looking at the 5000 Nexus with 2000 Nexus FEX extenders. What is the best way to deploy this? What interfaces does the 2000 FEX connect into the 5000? Is the 5000 switch ports used to just connect 2K for additnal ports?

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/switches/nexus-5000-series-switches/index.html

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/switches/nexus-5672up-switch/index.html

Also in the link, the 5672UP says it has 48x 10Gbps, 6x 40gbps QSFP and 16 Unified ports with different speed rating. What are Unified ports?

[Sergiu.Daniluk]

Hi @romanroma 

A lot of questions, but let's start with the beginning:

1. Is the 5000 switch ports used to just connect 2K for additnal ports?

No. Nexus 5000 is just a switch, and you can use it as any other switch, except is designed for Data Centers, which means it will support DC-related features: vPC, fabricpath (long dead), FEXs, unified ports etc. and will miss campus-related features (for example PoE).  Because it is a DC switch, you will connect mainly servers to it. If you have have more servers then available ports, and you can extend the number of ports using FEXs.

2. What interfaces does the 2000 FEX connect into the 5000? 

Always the fabric ports (also called NIFs  - network interfaces), and are the one colored in yellow.

3. What is the best way to deploy this?

I believe you are referring to the supported topologies. This might be helpful: https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/docs/switches/nexus-2000-series-fabric-extenders/200363-nexus-2000-fabric-extenders-supported-un.html 

4. What are Unified ports?

A unified port is a physical port on a Nexus switch which can be configured as Ethernet, Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE), or native Fibre Channel port.

Since Nexus 5000 supports vPC, which is an important feature, and one of the most mature features on Nexus switches, I would strongly recommend reading this: https://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en/us/td/docs/switches/datacenter/sw/design/vpc_design/vpc_best_practices_design_guide.pdf 

Stay safe,

Sergiu

[romanroma]

@Sergiu.Daniluk 

Thank you again for you help. I will review the links you sent and I will have additional questions.

When you say "fabricpath (long dead)" I am getting handed a legacy data center network, which runs fabricpath (you helped me in the past with questions on path selection in fabricpath). Since the concept/techology is 'dead', what replaced it? What should I look at to start migrating to?

Thank you.

[Sergiu.Daniluk]

Hi @romanroma 

Yep. I remember the FP path selection :-) When I said 'dead' I was referring to the fact that nobody will build or design a new DC using fabricpath. The protocol is indeed an old DC technology, and is supported only on Nexus 5K/6K (which most of them are EOL) and Nexus 7K.

Nexus 9000 series which is the replacement for Nexus 5k/6k does not support FP.

If you are looking for a technology which is more scalable and better in many perspectives compared with FP, the one to go to is VXLAN with BGP EVPN control plane.

If you want to learn more about this technology, I would recommend the following resources:

1. Building Data Centers with VXLAN BGP EVPN: A Cisco NX-OS Perspective

2. VXLAN BGP EVPN whitepaper 

3. any ciscolive presentation related to vxlan.

Let me know if you have any questions :-)

Stay safe,

Sergiu

[romanroma]

Hi @Sergiu.Daniluk 

I looked over the links, and when I am in the office tomorrow, I will try to determine what model is being used. I do no vPC are all over the place, and it looks similar to the Dual Homed Host (Active/Active) and Active-Active FEX  Design; however, I am not sure.

In addition, when connecting a 2k to a 5k, what ports or cables do you recommend? Does it matter how you pin the 2k: static vs port-channel? I believe the current configuration is 'static'; however, from my limited knowledge, all ports are flapped if pinning is changed. I am looking at the bets solution or possible way to connect a 2k, since i will be deploying a VDI solution, with 12x 10Gbps interfaces. 6x interfaces to 5k-A and 6x interfaces to the other 5k-B; however, I am a near capacity on the 5k, so I wanted to add a 2k FEX, to increase port density.

Thank for the new additional links for VXLAN.