Switching design question - Unable to stack due to distance

[xylofi]

What would be the best way to approach this situation.

You have 2 cabinets that house patch panels that feed either side of the building, the distance between the cabinets exceed the maximum stacking cable length that's available. There is connectivity between the cabinets via fibre and ethernet. Due to budget constraints a collapsed core isn't an option. So we have essentially 2 stacks of switches, where one of them houses the WAN connectivity. Is the only viable option here to setup a trunk link between these 2 stacks? I know stackwise virtual exists, but they're limited to certain models right?

Any input would be appreciated / insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

[Joseph W. Doherty]

"I know stackwise virtual exists, but they're limited to certain models right?"

True, I believe, but supported by several models, or possibly all the models, per switch model series, I also believe.  However, also recall (?) StackWise virtual might be limited to just two physical units (basically it's a variant of VSS, which by the way, for optimal usage, everything should be connected to both physical switches).

The two big advantages of a switch stack are one logical device (actually that can be a disadvantage too) and the bandwidth provided by the "special" stack cables.

Running two stacks, you can mitigate, somewhat, the loss of bandwidth using Etherchannel, especially if some of your stack members support higher bandwidth ports (e.g. 25, 40, 100 Gbps).  How much cross stack bandwidth do you believe you need?

[xylofi]

Not a lot, most traffic will egress over the WAN, that has a circuit speed of 200mb/s. We'll probably etherchannel 2x1G links.

[Flavio Miranda]

Hi

 You did not mention which switch you have but Yes stackwise virtual is for newer switches 

 The sution seems simple to me. If you can not have layer 2 between switches,  do a layer 3 connection.

[xylofi]

Sorry, these are 9300 48-P switches.

[Joseph W. Doherty]

Oh, BTW, are you also familiar with horizonal stacking using the 3M cables?

v-------v v-v
SW1 SW2 SW3 SW4
  ^-^ ^-----^

[xylofi]

I'm not, thanks for the TIL.