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Cisco Stacking Switches—StackWise and StackWise Plus

Stackable Switch

 Allows access to all switches with a single IP address


 Provides the means to manage the stack via CLI or MIB
 Can connect all switches in a physical ring topology
 Traffic flows in either direction of the ring, some Resiliency
 Automatic Master selection & backup 1:N
 Automatic IOS versioning and Update!
 Automatic configuration of new members
 Automatic unit replacement (configuration of old switch retained)
 Stateful switch over in case of master failures
 Ring resiliency similar to FDDI, provides HA and Resiliency
 Sub-millisecond Master failover
 Smart Multicast
 Cross-stack features (Etherchannel and QoS)

Cisco StackWise (Plus)

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Logical and physical ring architecture of the Catalyst 3k
Comprises two 16 Gbps counter-rotating rings
-Data on both rings when fully connected:
Stackwise-32 Gbps
Stackwise Plus-64 Gbps

Internal Connection:
 On Cisco 3750V2, 3750G: The Stack Ring is the switching fabric
 Cisco 3750E, 3750X: The Stack Ring only interconnects the individual Switch
Fabrics

Understanding the Stack Cable

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Eight TX/RCV pairs per ring
That is 16 pairs (8 channels per ring)

Each TX/RCV pair has 2 traces that use differential signaling.


That is 32 traces in total

Each TX/RCV pair runs at 2.5 Gbps


8B/10B encoding is used.
(for every ten bits sent, eight bits are data and two bits are overhead)

Understanding the Stack Ring Speed

16 Channels x 2.5 Gbps x 8B/10B = 32Gbps


Or bidirectional 16 Gbps per cable = 32Gbps
Or Two Rings running at 16Gpbs each = 32Gbps

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Stackwise Vs Stackwise Plus

Spatial Reuse

Note: These are packets not tokens. There is only 1 token per ring.

Ring Healing

 The switch fabric or port ASIC closest to cable detects link down
-Criteria is coding violations in a period of time
-Loss of at most one packet that was being transmitted when ring broke
-Just microseconds for hardware to detect failure
 Each switch signals a bad link to stack its partner
 Both ends of the cable loop back on themselves
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