SG300-28P: System LED not on. everything else working.

[msma-cisco]

Hi Everyone,

Nice to meet you all.

I received an used SG300-28P today and immediately I found its System LED never lits. I upgraded the firmware to the latests but did not make any difference. So far I have configured the switch for my environment and everything is working fine including VLAN, L3 routing and PoE works on all ports.

I am puzzled, not sure what's wrong with it. In the System Summary of the Web GUI it indicates the System LED is constantly on. But the physical one is just dead (never lits including boot)

I hope its just the LED itself, the switch is definately out of warranty. What diagnostics can I run myself to understand it?

Thanks,

Mark

[Aaron Wu]

Hi, Siming

Are you having problem with only the system LED or all the LED on the switch?

There's a power saving feature in 300 series switch to disable the port LED. The configuration is in Green Ethernet > Properties page.

But the system LED should always be on when the switch is operating. You can try backup the configuration and factory default the device to see if there's any difference, if it still doesn't work after that, it may indicate a hardware problem.

[msma-cisco]

Hi Qin

Thanks for your reply.

All port LEDs are working well. It's the System LED on the left. System Summary shows the System LED is on. But physically its not.

When I received the switch I did a hard reset by holding the Reset push button on the front (>10 sec).  And that didn't make any difference.

Since the switch seems to be working well so far, should I be concerned about that? Or is there any diagnostic program I can run on it?

Thanks,

Siming

[puneelam]

Hi Siming

Sometimes even due to power cables LEDs wont on but system will work. Check with different power cable and if possible check the system logs.

To configure the Green Ethernet and more information about Green Ethernet the following link will be helpful:

http://sbkb.cisco.com/CiscoSB/Loginr.aspx?login=1&pid=2&app=search&vw=1&articleid=929

The following link will help you to understand  more about the system logs:

http://sbkb.cisco.com/CiscoSB/Loginr.aspx?login=1&pid=2&app=search&vw=1&articleid=95

Thanks & Regards

Punith Kumar Neelam

SBCD Engineer

[mpyhala]

Hi Siming,

From the Quick Start Guide:

System LED—(Green) Lights steady when the switch is powered on, and

flashes when booting, performing self tests, and acquiring an IP address. If

the LED flashes Amber, the switch has detected a hardware failure.

It is likely that the System LED has failed. This should not affect the performance of the switch.

- Marty

[almoncad]

Hello Siming,

If everything is working properly on the switch, then you shouldn't be worried about the system led. The system led itself is simply not working.

This is the information you need to know about the system led:

• Off - If the system led is off, it means the switch is not powered on (which in your case is false, since you told us the switch is working as it should, so that means you have a faulty led)
• Green - If the system led is green, it means the switch working normally. If the system led is green and it flashes constantly, it means the switch is using the factory default IP address (192.168.1.254) to access to the switch. If it is solid green, it means that the switch has either an IP assigned via DHCP, or statically by the administrator.
• Amber - If the system led is amber, it means there is a problem with the switch

As you can see, you won't be able to get information about the system led when is green or amber, since it is not working.

I would suggest that you properly configure system logs on the switch, perform constantly backups to the running/startup configuration, and keep track of which IP address you are using to access the switch GUI/CLI, that way if you forget your IP address, or if there is a problem with the switch, you know where to find the correct information.

Please let us know if you have further questions.

Alejandro Moncada
SBCD Engineer
almoncad@cisco.com

[msma-cisco]

Thanks very much for all the information. I will keep my fingers crossed.