6500 Compatibility Guide

[mwhitlow]

What's the best Cisco tool (if any) to input in a bunch of different 6500 blade part numbers and make sure all of the blades are compatible with each other?

Thanks in advance,

Mike

[Collin Clark]

I don't know of a tool (I hope someone posts there is one). That type of work is usually handled by either your Cisco VAR pre-sales engineer or the Cisco pre-sales engineer assigned to your account. I usually do that work for my customers (I am VAR pre-sales). How long is your list, maybe I can help out?

[Amit Singh]

Mike,

There is not Cisco tool as such for this hardware compatibility. The best way to accomplish this is to use the release notes and make sure that you double check the hardware/modules against the software being used. If all the modules are supported in a common software release, they are compatible and you are good to go. Release notes also lists the caveates if any.

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

Cheers,

-amit singh

[mwhitlow]

I have contacted Cisco Pre-Sales Support before and they have been extremely helpful every single time. I was just wondering if there was a way I could do it myself quickly and easily. I plain flat don't have time to read through dozens of pages of notes. I miss the days when I DID have time to do that.

Anyway, thanks for the replies.

[Collin Clark]

It certainly does take some time. The major gotchas are what linecards are supported by the Supervisor and the chassis (check the datasheets of each). If you're running non EoL/EoS hardware you're usually good to go. For IOS, Safe Harbor is a safe bet on supporting current linecards and modules. The pre-sales guys know where to look and know off the top of their head (usually) what works with what though.