Can you use the switchports on your standby supervisor?

[chrisrich09]

Hi, I'm wondering if you can use the switchports on your standby supervisor or are the active supervisors ports the only ports available for use? I'm thinking of using 2 x sup-2t's and want to use the 2 x 10GE ports.

[nkarpysh · Accepted solution]

Hello,

Yes you can see and use ports on the stndby Supervisor.

Nik

[rsimoni · Accepted solution]

yes,

•When a redundant supervisor engine is in standby mode, the two Gigabit Ethernet interfaces on the redundant supervisor engine are always active unless you enter the fabric switching-mode allow dcef-only command.

•With a Supervisor Engine 720, if all the installed switching modules have DFCs, enter the fabric switching-mode allow dcef-only command to disable the Ethernet ports on both supervisor engines, which ensures that all modules are operating in dCEF mode and simplifies switchover to the redundant supervisor engine.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/partner/docs/switches/lan/catalyst6500/ios/12.2SX/configuration/guide/nsfsso.html

but we aware of Sup-720-10GE gotchas:

Supervisor Engine 720-10GE Restrictions

•In RPR redundancy mode, the ports on a Supervisor Engine 720-10GE in standby mode are disabled.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/switches/lan/catalyst6500/ios/12.2SX/release/notes/hardware.html

Regards,

Riccardo