Migrating the existing Cisco ... but to what ?

[Mat Dan]

Hello,

Being in charge of " clearing network organization " of a small company (50 employees) where I am the sysadmin and now the network admin (CCNA is somewhere lost in the past, but I'm working on it :)). There is currently no VLAN and other stuff, and some of you already gave me answers on the subject (thanks again !). I was just told " By the way, see if we should change the existing devices ".

That's where you come in.

The configuration is quite simple :

1 - Dell 5324 - 24 ports hosts servers

1 - Cisco 3548 XL - 48 ports hosts hosts (it is, in a way, the core even if there're no vlan, everything goes there)

1 - Cisco 3550 - 48 ports hosts hosts

1 - HP 1920 - 24 ports that hosts hosts in another part of the building (10 hosts max are really used)

All the switches are in the same building, in the same bay but the last one that is around 25 meters from the main bay, in it's own little bay.

I'd honestly like to stay with Cisco, but as always, we're on a budget :) ... So, could one say that, to stay in a L3 (for vlan routing purpose) level, that there are different " Categories / Families " of switches at Cisco, or is it just " Buy a 3850 " ? If different families exist, do all use the same CLI ? I'd like to have Cisco-only switches replace all the existing.

Is there a well calibrated solution ?

Thanks in advance :)

[Mark Malone]

Just as an option look at 3650s  they do layer 3 and are cheaper than 38s not much though

Cheaper again would be the newer 2960XR switches that also do basic layer 3 functions

I would check exactly what your current switches are doing and see if these models support it but they should no problem

If you have servers and pcs though you want may to stick to at least a 3k series rather than a standard access switch

All of them have similar ios commands , the newer switches are ios-xe based 36s 38s but commands are identical mostly to ios

copper can reach up well over 25 metres up to 100 so you should be good to connect or

 you could connect the switches by 1gb fibre uplink glc-sx-mm works on any of the switches above , LC -LC fibre om3 50db will work , rather than copper  to get

You could also look into stacking the switches for more power/throughout and resiliency with stacking cables if any there are within a few metres of each other

really the only switches that don't do a layer 3 now at some level are the very basic 2960s lanlite switches , they are pure layer 2 only

### You really only need to change your devices if there over utilized , under pressure or out of support , your cisco switches are definitely out of support

there just some other options anyway

[Joseph W. Doherty]

There are different families of Cisco devices, but often, at least Enterprise level and above, CLIs are similar.

For a budget, you might want to also look into Cisco's SMB family of devices.

Also for a budget, with Cisco Enterprise level devices, chose carefully the equipment you need, also chose carefully licensing. Additionally shop around for new or refurbished equipment.  Prices can vary much.

For example, years ago I was working in a small company that was looking to buy some (then) new Catalyst 1900s and 2900s.  The VAR our company used provided an equipment quote for nearly list price.  When we mentioned the company owner noticed the big discount houses sold same for about half the price, why not buy from them?  With just posing that question, the VAR almost met the discount house prices.

[paul driver]

Hello

You need to look at any expected growth for this network as opposed to what it has now, What kind of resiliency do you or would you wish to have, And as this is a cisco forum I would tend to say any suggestion provided would be cisco based.

50 + users, 144 port availability isn’t an awful lot of users, but add on say future phone/wifi availability the network usage increases and performance is degraded.

So you need to ask a few questions to your managers about their future plans for the company  as just going out a buying new switching hardware and not knowing the possible future expectations  wouldn’t be a good idea.

That said, Given your existing hardware I would say a stackable non modular option (3650,3850) like Mark has mentioned.

These are switches can provide L2/L3 switching, QOS and POE functions with gigabit port access all running as one virtual device for resiliency.   I would also suggest looking into segregating your network into designated functional vlans for the current and future usage. (servers, users, printers, video, phone, wifi etc..)

res
Paul

[Julio E. Moisa]

Hi

I think it was already covered by the other members, but I would like to add my 2 cents, the following link could be useful to find the proper device for your requirements:

http://www.cisco.com/c/dam/assets/prod/switches/cisco-switch-selector-how-to/index.html?utm_source=www.uoota.com

Hope it is useful

:-)

[Mat Dan]

First, thanks all for your help :-)

I've been checking a little and realize switches in production are working like L2 switches, no more, no less, nothing specific in the running-config. Everything's plugged and there we go.

Using VLANs, we could remove the Dell server switch, and put the servers in a dedicated VLAN on one of the under-populated switch, and replace 2 switches instead of 3.

There's no possible expansion of the building but adding plugs in some offices (no more than 20 I'd say) but I think it would be part of another project to anticipate now to such a point (where I would include a dedicated or more advanced expansion switch), being on an airport zone.

I've removed WIFI from the " LAN " network and put it on a dedicated PFsense VM, everything being seperated and leaving the network by the SDSL router directly. A little switch directly connects the 2 existing Access points to the captive portal that handles all the Wifi stuff via PFSense. It is now separately managed and watched from the " company " network.

So, I think the existing " number " of switches, minus the " server " switch would make it. The possibilities of extension mentioned before would be in the " other part of the building " so upgrading the existing 24P HP 1920 to a 48P would be a good solution I guess.

I've checked the 3650/3850, and I already heard some telling me ". But Mat, I know those HP 2920 do some good work for a way smaller cost of the Cisco hardware ".

From what I understand, I guess 1x3650 would be a good thing (let's call it " core " switch). I'm wondering if a 24 ports 3650 being a core with some " lesser " switches being access switches would be a good idea, or if I should try to stick to " All 3650 " ? I haven't looked into Cisco SMB switches, do they do some " good " stuff too for a small company, maybe it be for core or access switches ?

Finally, pricing is something I'm having a hard time to understand :). I think I'll need to get more information on the subject. Indeed, when I " simply " google, I find a Cisco Catalyst 3650-24TS-L for 2404 € (very affordable !!!) and then a Cisco Catalyst 3650-24TS-E for 6000 € (way less affordable). I think I need to check what these L, E (and many other) specifically mean and bring to the table.

Thanks again for your help :-)

[Mark Malone]

L is for LAN only usually lanbase image

E is for enterprise or enhanced  usually so it can do full layer 3

I've checked the 3650/3850, and I already heard some telling me ". But Mat, I know those HP 2920 do some good work for a way smaller cost of the Cisco hardware ".

Remember if you use Dell or HP you need to use there form of STP which will be MST usually , they don't support pvst as its Cisco proprietary so integrating them with current Cisco devices can be difficult  , either way im not going to tell you to use HP or Dell anyway as its Cisco forum but I have seen issues when integrating these vendors together at layer 2 but small network like yours shouldn't be too much of an issue to integrate   :)

see this for some more letter explanations

http://www.fiber-optic-tutorial.com/explanation-of-the-model-of-cisco-switches.html

[paul driver]

Hello Mark

I agree, Having felt the pain integrating these two vendors with cisco, It can be a messy and time consuming with various caveats along the way - I have found the Dells have a "lighter" version of the cisco cli but not as many features offered with cisco, The HPs seem to fair better but I would say if not cisco I would personally go for Juniper.

res
Paul;

[Mat Dan]

I've been checking, comparing, all the SMB stuff, 3650, 3850, the options ...

I think I've got an idea of an interesting approach now :

Bay one :

- One 3650 TS-E 24 ports will be the core

- Two Cisco 2960-X 48 TS-L will be there to handle distribution

Bay two :

- One Cisco 2960-X 48 TS-L will be there to handle distribution

I'll be around 10000 €, and I find this correct for our little company to invest in quality material.

I don't know much about " SPF " interfaces : does one need specific ones ? (If not, could someone give me an idea of something dimensioned with my current design ?) ?

I hope my approach is okay, if not, just tell me :)

[Mark Malone]

sfps that are supported on those switches in the link below

http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/interfaces_modules/transceiver_modules/compatibility/matrix/GE_Tx_Matrix.html

standard glc-sx-mm should do you if you go fibre uplinks or use copper sfps glc-t either

You could not use any sfps either and just use copper but having a fibre uplink is good and you can bundle some links together in ether channel for better performance between the switches

[Mat Dan]

Thanks for the information Mark !

What did you think of my approach with a 3750 TS-E as core and some 2960-X for distribution ?

[Mark Malone · Accepted solution]

personally from experience 2960s are not the best switches if your going to be connecting servers to them , there built as access switches for access devices , they don't have the buffer dept for server traffic or large volumes of constant traffic , the same issue was there for some of the previous 3k series too but this has changed and is better with the 36s and 38s models , if you have a heavy server load on a 2960 you will see packet drops increment as the buffer fills up , this can be tweaked with qos too to prevent it though  if you have servers I would connect them on the 36 even though an access /dist / core setup the servers would usually be connected at dist layer but this is a small network , you could test both switches see what works bets for you but you may run into drops occurring more on the 2960 switch

[Mat Dan]

Thank you Mark,

That's what I was thinking about : plugging the servers in the 3650 (With those 24 ports, there's enough room to plug both ESX for a total of 8 network links, the NAS on one link, two standalone servers for a total of 4 links, all the rest being the firewall link and the interconnection with the other switches mentioned. So it would lead us to 13 server/NAS links, one firewall link, 3 "switching" links (maybe an etherchannel if necessary considering the available remaining ports), an administration channel, so an actual total of 18 " used " ports on 24. I know it's not state of the art, but I think it's acceptable on such a small structure ?

About the " VLAN " setting, is this a correct approach :

- Voice

- Users

- Servers

- Network Equipments

- Management (maybe I could put this one with Network Equipments ?)

- Printers

[Mark Malone · Accepted solution]

if its already working in current environment should be no problem as these are much more powerful than your current devices you listed as there lot newer , it all really depends on the load though too

your vlan setup looks fine , couple of things I would do

-daisy chaining pcs and phones to save port space in access switches use voice and data vlan under same port

-you could put printers in your data vlan just give them a static ip and exclude it from data dhcp range

-for mgmt. if you wanted you could build a proper mgmt. network as its so small , basically your new switches will come with a separate mgmt. interface , utilize one of the older switches that's going to be replaced , connect new mgmt. ports back to the old switch and then to the FW and source all your mgmt. traffic on the new switches off the mgmt. interface and send it to the FW , that will be a true oob.. out of band network completely segregated from your production network , or you could just use a vlan :)

-I would definitely use etherchannels between your devices and then set the load balancing for the etherchannel so it utilizes all the links as much as possible , this can require a  it of testing but will be worth it when done

-make the core the spanning-tree root for layer 2 for all vlans

[Mat Dan]

Thank you very much for your help :-)))