Fex Switches, changing dual to single

[Bobby M]

While upgrading a site - I experienced a lot more downtime for dual homed fexes vs single homed fexes. For my second site upgrade, I'm leaning towards converting my dual fexes to single home.

My fex ports are pretty basic configuration. Switchport mode access or switchport mode trunk, with no port-channels/vpc (also why i don't like dual home fexes)

Two uplinks per fex, one to each parent. Is there anything I should be aware of when doing this conversion? I was hoping to create third fex uplink on a parent so there would be three uplinks active, then I would shut down the port on the parent switch with one active link and remove the fex from that parent all together.

Or

Should I shut down one link, remove the fex config from that parent, then enable the configuration for a new port on the active parent?

[M02@rt37]

Hello @Bobby M,

Converting your dual-homed FEXes to single-homed FEXes is a valid approach to simplify your network configuration.

Also, create the third FEX uplink before or after disabling one link, both approaches can work. The key here is to ensure minimal disruption during the migration.

[balaji.bandi]

What Model of Nexus Switch ? Dual home have high availability and When you Upgrade vPC ISSU you should follow some guide Lines so the FEX work as expected - i am sure you need 1 Downtime for the FEX to reboot when you upgrade Code but i have noticed as you mentioned many downtimes.

If the FEX Dual Homed and end device is Dual Dual home you should not see major issue.

Single homed FEX and single Homed device (any way have downtime) when the FEX reload.