3850-24XS-E stacked as 10G Aggregation switches?

[Aileron88]

Hi all,

I'm looking for an aggregation switch for approximately 37 access switches all with 10G uplinks. The site have some 6506-E's with older line cards at the moment so we're refreshing this kit. The 6500 10G line cards look to be heavily oversubscribed whereas the 3850-24XS-E seems to have no oversubscription at all & comes in at a good price.

I'll also be uplinking about 80G off each switch with room to expand at a later date if needed.

Am I missing something obvious here or is the 3850 just that good!?

Thanks,

Adam

[Philip D'Ath]

As far as I am aware, the 3850's are 1:1 for the 10Gbe ports.  They are very good.

C6800-16P10G= is 2:1 oversubscribed.  That is not too bad is it?

A cheaper, not as good (in my opinion) option is a Nexus 3k (such as N3K-C3524P-10GX).  Only use these with 10Gbe ports.  They have small amounts of buffering, so you don't really want to mix 1Gb and 10Gbe ports.  I would also only use these for a layer 2 solution.

But I'd rather have a 3850 ...

Also note the 3850 with lots of 48 x 10Gbe ports can not be stacked with other 3850's.

[Philip D'Ath]

You could also consider a 4500-X.  You can also VSS these together.  They make a very nice solution.