What Cisco switch model would you buy for your Cores?

[Andrew White]

Hello,

I have been asked to upgrade a HP switch LAN.  I'm not sure of the models of HP, but they have a flat L2 subnet for around 600 users.  1 VLAN for all users, servers and printers - ouch!! 

I will be creating many new L3 VLANs for servers, departments and printers etc.

What I did on my last network project was buy 2 Nexus 3K core switches and connected them together using a vPC and created multiple VLANs/SVIs as HSRPs for redundancy across both Nexus's.  Then I created 2 stacks of Cisco 2960x switches (4 x 48 ports in each stack = 8).  I then used a Qsfp to sfp cables from Nexus switches to the 2960x switches to give me lots of bandwidth to the cores and sort up port channels.

I think I may use a similar setup but is the Nexus still a chose for core switches?  I'm not sure the HP switches will get replaced in this project for the user ports, it's just the core.  So I'm not sure of the uplink speeds to the HP for the core atm.

Anyway I will work on the core section first and any model suggestion would be great.

Thanks

[balaji.bandi]

As per Cisco recomendation

Nexus is more of DC environment, where you need to lot server switchting. (3K mainly designed for low latency kind of setup).

i would suggest to look at Cat 9500 or 9600 as Core Switch, for the Enterprise Network, Cost wise they are bit cheaper compare to nexus.

https://www.cisco.com/c/en_uk/solutions/enterprise-networks/catalyst-9000.html#~products

[Andrew White]

They do have a small datacenter onsite (VMware and SANs).

With the Catalyst 9Ks how would these be stacked toegther to for one switch for redundancy and reduce the risk of spanning tree loops.  I'm assuming they are just like stacking the 2960x/3850s?

I'd like to create to user stacks (HP or Cisco) to these cores and having them stacked will make things easy for port channel creation.

Also would you just create SVIs on the core stack (L3 VLANs) as it would be seen as "one" switch?

Thanks  

[Martin L]

in my place we still use old but golden 6500 switches
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/switches/catalyst-6500-series-switches/tsd-products-support-series-home.html

[balaji.bandi]

6500 soon going to end EoL / 6800 also same situation sooner

Cisco more concentrating on Cat 9K Series, for investment and longer support suggested 9K models.

[Martin L]

I agree except I see 9400 10-slot sw support 384 ports
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/switches/catalyst-9400-series-switches/index.html

[balaji.bandi]

Look at the 9600 model new Core replacing 65XX and 68XX

[Scott Hodgdon]

Andrew, To determine the best platform, we need a little information to understand the design and ultimate goal for the network. To that end, please answer a few questions: 1. How many links of each speed will be required to be connected to the core ? 2. Is the ultimate goal to go down a software-defined path, utilizing something like Cisco SD-Access ? 3. What level of resiliency is required here ? 4. Is segmentation / micro-segmentation in the campus a requirement now or down the road ? 5. Do you have a diagram of the current network you can share ? Cheers, Scott Hodgdon Senior Technical Marketing Engineer Enterprise Networking Group