Stacking on Cisco Nexus switches

[Julian Ortiz]

Hi guys,

I know Cisco Nexus switches don't support VSS or StackWise stacking, just vPC. The idea is the same and to view the two switches as one from the downlink device's perspective. But I think vPC is more complex, at least in terms of configuration than VSS/StackWise. Is there a reason by which Cisco Nexus switches don't support VSS/StackWise and only vPC? Is there any advantage of vPC over VSS/StackWise?

Regards,

Julián

[josedelpino]

Hi  fjulianom,

I also think that stacking is simpler and easier to maintain that vPC, however the problem with stacking is that is not the best when it comes to redundancy. 

When you use stacking all switchs share a single control plane, this means that a single event can take the whole stack down. Even something as simple as a software update implies a service interruption since the whole stack needs to be restarted at the same time. Because of this there is a strong argument againts stacking critical devices like datacenter switchs and is more apropiate to use stacking in access switchs.

[Julian Ortiz]

Hi Jose,

Then this means that when you have a stack all the members share the master's control plane? And when you have a vPC every switch has its own control plane and all of them are synchronized?

It seems so, Sensie briefly explains these differences in the following post:

https://learningnetwork.cisco.com/thread/78073

Regards,

Julián

[117222400]

the purpose of stacking is to increase port density, which is not the typical scenario in DataCenter