Nexus7000 VPC Best Practices and Design External

Nexus 7000 virtual Port-Channel
Best Practices & Design Guidelines
Roberto Mari Technical Marketing Engineer
Data Center Business Unit
November 2009 version 1.1
2009 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.
Cisco Confidential
Agenda
Feature Overview & Terminology vPC Design Guidance & Best Practices
Building a vPC domain Attaching to a vPC domain
Layer 3 and vPC

Spanning Tree Recommendations Data Center Interconnect (& Encryption) HSRP with vPC
vPC and Services

vPC latest enhancements ISSU
Convergence and Scalability vPC Hands-on Lab Information Reference Material

2009 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential
Feature Overview & Terminology

vPC Definition
Allow a single device to use a port channel across two upstream switches Eliminate STP blocked ports Uses all available uplink bandwidth Dual-homed server operate in active-active mode Provide fast convergence upon link/device failure Reduce CAPEX and OPEX
Logical Topology without vPC
Available on current and future hardware for M1 and D1 generation cards.

Logical Topology with vPC
Feature Overview & Terminology

vPC Terminology
vPC peer-keepalive link vPC peer-link
vPC peer a vPC switch, one of a pair

vPC member port one of a set of ports (port channels) that form a vPC vPC the combined port channel between the vPC peers and the downstream device
CFS protocol
vPC peer vPC
vPC peer-link Link used to synchronize state between vPC peer devices, must be 10GbE
vPC peer-keepalive link the keepalive link between vPC peer devices, i.e., backup to the vPC peer-link vPC VLAN one of the VLANs carried over the peer-link and used to communicate via vPC with a peer device. non-vPC VLAN One of the STP VLANs not carried over the peer-link CFS Cisco Fabric Services protocol, used for state synchronization and configuration validation between vPC peer devices
vPC vPC member member port port
vPC non-vPC device
Cisco Confidential
Building a vPC Domain

Configuration Steps
Following steps are needed to build a vPC (Order does Matter!)
1. Configure globally a vPC domain on both vPC devices 2. Configure a Peer-keepalive link on both vPC peer switches (make sure is operational) NOTE: When a vPC domain is configured the keepalive must be operational to allow a vPC domain to successfully form.
3. Configure (or reuse) an interconnecting port-channel between the vPC peer switches
4. Configure the inter-switch channel as Peer-link on both vPC devices (make sure is operational) 5. Configure (or reuse) Port-channels to dual-attached devices
6. Configure a unique logical vPC and join port-channels across different vPC peers
vPC peerkeepalive link vPC peer-link
vPC peer
Standalone Port-channel
vPC
Cisco Confidential
vPC member port

6

Peer Link
Definition:
Standard 802.1Q Trunk Can Carry vPC and non vPC VLANs* Carries Cisco Fabric Services messages (tagged as CoS=4 for reliable communication) Carries flooded traffic from a vPC peer Carries STP BPDUs, HSRP Hellos, IGMP updates, etc.
vPC peer-link
Requirements:
Member ports must be 10GE interfaces one of the N7KM132XP-12 modules
Peer-link are point-to-point. No other device should be inserted between the vPC peers.
Recommendations (strong ones!)

Minimum 2x 10GbE ports on separate cards for best resiliency. Dedicated 10GbE ports (not shared mode ports)
*It is Best Practice to split vPC and non-vPC

VLANs on different Inter-switch Port-Channels.
7

Peer Link with Single 10G Module Common Nexus 7000 configuration: 1x 10G, 7x 1G cards vPC recommendation is 2 10G cards Potential problem occurs if Nexus 7000 is L3 boundary with single 10G card Use Object Tracking Feature available in 4.2 More information from CCO:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/switches/datacenter/sw/4_2/nxos/interfaces/configuration/guide/if_vPC.html#wp1529488
Cisco Confidential

Scenario:
Peer Link with Single 10G Module Object Tracking

vPC deployments with a single N7KM132XP-12 card, where core and peerlink interfaces are localized on the same card.
This scenario is vulnerable to accesslayer isolation if the 10GE card fails on the primary vPC. vPC Object Tracking Solution: Leverages object tracking capability in vPC (new CLI commands are added). Peer-link and Core interfaces are tracked as a list of boolean objects. vPC object tracking suspends vPCs on the impaired device, so traffic can get diverted over the remaining vPC peer.
e1/ e1/
e1/ e1/ e1/ e1/ vPC PKL vPC PL e1/ e1/ e2/
L3 L2
vPC Primary
e2/
vPC Secondary
rhs-7k-1(config-vpc-domain)# track <object>

9

Peer-Keepalive (1 of 2)
Definition: Heartbeat between vPC peers Active/Active (no Peer-Link) detection Messages sent on 2 second interval
vPC peerkeepalive link
3 second hold timeout on peer-link loss

Fault Tolerant terminology is specific to VSS and deprecated in vPC. Packet Structure: UDP message on port 3200, 96 bytes long (32 byte payload), includes version, time stamp, local and remote IPs, and domain ID. Keepalive messages can be captured and displayed using the onboard Wireshark Toolkit.
Recommendations:
Should be a dedicated link (1Gb is adequate)
Should NOT be routed over the Peer-Link

Can optionally use the mgmt0 interface (along with management traffic) As last resort, can be routed over L3 infrastructure
11

Peer-Keepalive (2 of 2)
Cautions/Additional Recommendations: When using supervisor management interfaces to carry the vPC peerkeepalive, do not connect them back to back between the two switches. Only one management port will be active a given point in time and a supervisor switchover may break keep-alive connectivity Use the management interface only if you have an out-of-band management network (management switch in between).
Management Switch vPC_PK
Management Network
vPC_PK
Standby Management Interface Active Management Interface
vPC_PL
vPC1
vPC2
Cisco Confidential
12

vPC Member Port
Definition: Port-channel member of a vPC peer. Requirements: Configuration needs to match other vPC peers member port config. In case of inconsistency a VLAN or the entire port-channel may suspend (i.e. MTU mismatch). Number of member ports on both vPC peers is not required to match. Up to 8 active ports between both vPC peers (16-way port-channel can be build with multi-layer vPC)
vPC member port
13

VDC Interaction
vPC works seamlessly in any VDC based environment. One vPC domain per VDC is supported, up to the maximum number of VDCs supported in the system.
It is still necessary to have a separate vPC peer-link and vPC PeerKeepalive Link infrastructure for each VDC deployed.
Can vPC run between VDCs on the same switch? This scenario should technically work, but it is NOT officially supported and has not been extensively tested by our QA team. Could be useful for Demo or hands on, but It is NOT recommended for production environments. Will consolidate redundant points on the same box with VDCs (e.g. whole aggregation layer on a box) and introduce a single point of failure. ISSU will NOT work in this configuration, because the vPC devices can NOT be independently upgraded.
14
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


15
Attaching to a vPC domain

The One and Only Rule
ALWAYS dual attach devices to a vPC Domain!!!

16
Attaching to a vPC Domain

IEEE 802.3ad and LACP
Definition:
Port-channel for devices for devices dual-attached to the vPC pair. Provides local load balancing for port-channel members STANDARD 802.3ad port channel
Access Device Requirements

STANDARD 802.3ad capability LACP Optional
Recommendations:
Use LACP when available for better failover and misconfiguration protection
vPC Regular member Portport channel port
vPC
Cisco Confidential
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My device cant be dual attached!
Recommendations (in order of preference):
1. ALWAYS try to dual attach devices using vPC (not applicable for routed links). PROS: Ensures minimal disruption in case of peer-link failover and consistent behavior with vPC dualactive scenarios. Ensures full redundant active/active paths through vPC. CONS: None 2. If (1) is not an option connect the device via a vPC attached access switch (could use VDC to create a virtual access switch). PROS: Ensures minimal disruption in case of peer-link failover and consistent behavior with vPC dualactive scenarios. Availability limited by the access switch failure. CONS: Need for an additional access switch or need to use one of the available VDCs. Additional administrative burden to configure/manage the physical/Virtual Device 3. If (2) is not an option connect device directly to (primary) vPC peer in a non-vPC VLAN* and provide for a separate interconnecting port-channel between the two vPC peers. PROS: Traffic diverted on a secondary path in case of peer-link failover CONS: Need to configure and manage additional ports (i.e. port-channel) between the Nexus 7000 devices. 4. If (3) is not an option connect device directly to (primary) vPC peer in a vPC VLAN PROS: Easy deployment CONS: VERY BAD. Bound to vPC roles (no role preemption in vPC) , Full Isolation on peer-link failure when attached vPC toggles to a secondary vPC role.
* VLAN that is NOT part of any vPC and not present on vPC peer-link
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vPC and non-vPC VLANs (i.e. single attached .. )
P
1. Dual Attached
2. Attached via VDC/Secondary Switch

Orphan Ports
P S
P
S
Primary vPC Secondary vPC
3. Secondary ISL Port-Channel

4. Single Attached to vPC Device

19

My device only does STP!
Recommendations (in order of preference): 1. ALWAYS try dual attach devices using vPC PROS: Ensures minimal disruption in case of peer-link failover and consistent behavior with vPC dual-active scenarios. Ensures full redundant active/active paths through vPC.
CONS: None
2. If (1) is not an option connect the device via two independent links using STP. Use nonvPC VLANs ONLY on the STP switch.* PROS: Ensures minimal disruption in case of peer-link failover and consistent behavior with vPC dual-active scenarios. Ensures full redundant Active/Active paths on vPC VLANs.
CONS: Requires an additional STP port-channel between the vPC devices. Operational burden in provisioning and configuring separate STP and vPC VLAN domains. Only Active/Standby paths on STP VLANs.
3. If (2) is not an option connect the device via two independent links using STP. (Use vPC VLANs on this switch) PROS: Simplify VLAN provisioning and does not require allocation of an additional 10GE port-channel. CONS: STP and vPC devices may not be able to communicate each other in certain failure scenarios (i.e. when STP Root and vPC primary device do not overlap). All VLANs carried over the peer-link may suspend until the two adjacency forms and vPC is fully synchronized". * Run the same STP mode as the vPC domain. Enable portfast/port type edge on host facing ports
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vPC Design principles

Attaching to a vPC Domain - vPC and non-vPC VLANs (STP/vPC Hybrid)
Non vPC port-channel
P
S P
SR
PR S
1. All devices Dual Attached via vPC

SR P
2. Separate vPC and STP VLANs

PR S P S PR SR Primary vPC
Secondary vPC
Primary STP Root
Secondary STP Root
3. Overlapping vPC and STP VLANs

21

16-way Port-Channel (1 of 2)
Multi-Layer vPC can join 8 active ports port-channels in a unique 16way port-channel*
vPC peer side load-balancing is LOCAL to the peer

Each vPC peer has only 8 active links, but the pair has 16 active load balanced links
Nexus 7000 16-way port channel Nexus 5000
* Possible with any device supporting

vPC/MCEC and 8-way active port-channels
22

16-way Port-Channel (2 of 2)
16 active ports between 8 active port-channel devices and 16 active port-channel devices? vPC peer side load-balancing is LOCAL to the peer Each vPC peer has only 8 active links, but the pair has 16 active load balanced links to the downstream device supporting 16 active ports D-series N7000 line cards will also support 16 way active port-channel load balancing, providing for a potential 32 way vPC port channel!
Nexus 7000
16-port port-channel
Nexus 5000
Nexus 5000 16-port port-channel support introduced in 4.1(3)N1(1a) release

23
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


24
Layer 3 and vPC

Recommendations
Use separate L3 links to hook up routers to a vPC domain is still standing. Dont use L2 port channel to attach routers to a vPC domain unless you can statically route to HSRP address If both, routed and bridged traffic is required, use individual L3 links for routed traffic and L2 port-channel for bridged traffic
Switch Po2
Switch
Po2
7k1 Po1
7k2
L3 ECMP
Router
Router
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Layer 3 and vPC
What can happen (1 of 3)
vPC view
Layer 2 topology
Layer 3 topology
7k vPC 7k1 7k2 7k1 7k2
R could be any router, L3 switch or VSS building a port-channel
Port-channel looks like a single L2 pipe. Hashing will decide which link to chose
Cisco Confidential
Layer 3 will use ECMP for northbound traffic
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Layer 3 and vPC

1) Packet arrives at R
2) R does lookup in routing table and sees 2 equal paths going north (to 7k1 & 7k2) 3) Assume it chooses 7k1 (ECMP decision) 4) R now has rewrite information to which router it needs to go (router MAC 7k1 or 7k2) 5) L2 lookup happens and outgoing interface is port-channel 1
7k1
S Po2
7k2 Po1
6) Hashing determines which port-channel member is chosen (say to 7k2)

7) Packet is sent to 7k2 8) 7k2 sees that it needs to send it over the peer-link to 7k1 based on MAC address
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Layer 3 and vPC

9) 7k1 performs lookup and sees that it needs to send to S
10) 7k1 performs check if the frame came over peer link & is going out on a vPC. 11) Frame will only be forwarded if outgoing interface is NOT a vPC or if outgoing vPC doesnt have active interface on other vPC peer (in our example 7k2)
7k1 Po1 7k2
S Po2
Cisco Confidential
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Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


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Spanning Tree Recommendations

Overview STP Interoperability
STP Uses:
Loop detection (failsafe to vPC) Non-vPC attached device Loop management on vPC addition/removal
Requirements:
Needs to remain enabled, but doesnt dictate vPC member port state Logical ports still count, need to be aware of number of VLANs/port-channels deployed!
Best Practices:
Not recommended to enable Bridge Assurance feature on vPC channels (i.e. no STP network port type). Tracked by CSCsz76892.
vPC vPC STP is running to manage Make sure all switches in you layer 2 domain are running loops outside of vPCs with Rapid-PVST or MST (IOS default is non-rapid PVST+), direct domain, or before to avoid slow STP convergence (30+ secs) initial vPC configuration Remember to configure portfast (edge port-type) on host facing interfaces to avoid slow STP convergence (30+ secs)
Cisco Confidential
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Spanning Tree Recommendations

Port Configuration Overview
Data Center Core
N E B R L
Network port Edge or portfast port type Normal port type BPDUguard Rootguard Loopguard
Primary vPC
HSRP ACTIVE
Secondary vPC vPC Domain

N N
Aggregation
HSRP STANDBY Secondary Root

R R R
Layer 3
Primary Root
R R R
R R
Layer 2 (STP + Rootguard)
Access
L
E B
E B
E B
E B
E B
Layer 2 (STP + BPDUguard)
Cisco Confidential
31
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


32
Data Center Interconnect

Multi-layer vPC for Agg and DCI
DC 1
CORE
vPC domain 11 vPC domain 21
N E B F R
Network port Edge or portfast port type Normal port type BPDUguard
BPDUfilter
Rootguard
Long Distance
DC 2
CORE
N R R N -
AGGR
R N
- R
AGGR
vPC domain 10
vPC domain 20
R R
Key Recommendations
ACCESS ACCESS
E B
vPC Domain id for facing vPC layers should be different No Bridge Assurance on interconnecting vPCs BPDU Filter on the edge devices to avoid BPDU propagation No L3 peering between DCs (i.e. L3 over vPC)
E B
Server Cluster
Server Cluster
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Data Center Interconnect

Encrypted Interconnect
DC-1
Nexus 7010
DC-2
Nexus 7010
vPC
vPC
CTS Manual Mode (802.1AE 10GE line-rate encryption) No ACS is required
Nexus 7010
Nexus 7010
Cisco Confidential
34
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


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HSRP with vPC

FHRP Active/Active
Support for all FHRP protocols in Active/Active mode with vPC No additional configuration required
HSRP/VRRP Active: Active for shared L3 MAC HSRP/VRRP Standby: Active for shared L3 MAC
Standby device communicates with vPC manager produces to determine if vPC peer is Active HSRP/VRRP peer General HSRP best practices still applies. When running active/active aggressive timers can be relaxed (i.e. 2-router vPC case)
L3 L2
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HSRP with vPC

Do NOT use Object Tracking
Cautions: Not recommended using HSRP link tracking in a vPC configuration Reason: vPC will not forward a packet back on a vPC once it has crossed the peer-link, except in the case of a remote member port failure
L3 CORE
ACTIVE HSRP GW GW
VLAN 100, 200
STANDBY HSRP GW
L2/L3 Aggregation
VLAN 100
VLAN 200
37
Cisco Confidential
HSRP with vPC

L3 Backup Routing
Use an OSPF point-to-point adjacency (or equivalent L3 protocol) between the vPC peers to establish a L3 backup path to the Core through in case of uplinks failure A single point-to-point VLAN/SVI will suffice to establish a L3 neighborship.
OSPF OSPF
VLAN 99
L3 L2
Primary vPC
OSPF
Secondary vPC
Cisco Confidential
38
HSRP with vPC

Dual L2/L3 Pod Interconnect
Scenario: Provide L2/L3 interconnect between L2 Pods, or between L2 attached Datacenters (i.e. sharing the same HSRP group). A vPC domain without an active HSRP instance in a group would not able to forward traffic. Active Multi-layer vPC with single HSRP: L3 on the N7K supports Active/Active on one pair, and still allows normal HSRP behavior on other pair (all in one HSRP group) L3 traffic will run across Intra-pod link for non Active/Active L3 pair
Standby
Listen
Listen
Cisco Confidential
39
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


40
vPC and Services

Catalyst 6500 Services Chassis w. Services VDC Sandwich
Two Nexus 7000 Virtual Device Contexts used to sandwich services between virtual switching layers Layer-2 switching in Services Chassis with transparent services Services Chassis provides Etherchannel capabilities for interaction with vPC vPC running in both VDC pairs to provide Etherchannel for both inside and outside interfaces to Services Chassis
Design considerations:
Access switches requiring services are connected to subaggregation VDC Access switches not requiring services may be connected to aggregation VDC May be extended to support multiple virtualized service contexts by using multiple VRF instances in the subaggregation VDC
Design Cautions:
Be aware of the Layer 3 over vPC design caveat. If Peering at Layer 3 is required across the two vPC layers an alternative solution should be explored (i.e. using STP rather than vPC to attach service chassis)
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Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


42
vPC Latest Enhancements

Summary
Several enhancements to vPC:
vPC Object Tracking vPC Peer-Gateway vPC Delay Restore Multi-layer vPC with single HSRP group vPC unicast ARP handling vPC Exclude Interface-VLAN vPC single attached device Listing vPC Convergence and Scalability
For more details: 4.2 Release Notes
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/switches/datacenter/sw/4_2/nx-os/release/notes/42_nxos_release_note.html#wp218085
Cisco Confidential
43
vPC Latest Enhancements

vPC Peer-Gateway for NAS interoperability
Scenario: Interoperability with non RFC compliant features of some NAS devices (i.e. NETAPP Fast-Path or EMC IPReflect) NAS device may reply to traffic using the MAC address of the sender device rather than the HSRP gateway.
Local Routing for peer router mac Traffic
vPC PL
vPC PKL
L3 L2
Packet reaching vPC for the non local Router MAC address are sent across the peer-link and can be dropped if the final destination is behind another vPC.
vPC Peer-Gateway Solution: Allows a vPC switch to act as the active gateway for packets addressed to the peer router MAC (CLI command added in the vPC global config) N7k(config-vpc-domain)# peer-gateway
44
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


45
In-Service Software Upgrade (ISSU)

vPC System Upgrade/Downgrade
ISSU is still the recommended system upgrade in a multi-device vPC environment vPC system can be independently upgraded with no disruption to traffic. Upgrade is serialized and must be run one at the time (i.e. config lock will prevent synchronous upgrades) Configuration is locked on other vPC peer during ISSU.
4.1(3) 4.2(1) 4.1(3) 4.2(1)
4.1(3) 4.2(1)
Begin
End
Caveats
4.1(x)
4.2(x)
4.2(x)
4.1(x)
None
None
Cisco Confidential
46
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC latest enhancements

ISSU
Cisco Confidential
47
4.2(1) vPC Enhancements

Convergence Topology
20 flows @1000 pps
OSPF
L3 Core Nexus 7000
N7K-1 OSPF Po10
N7K-2
L2/L3 Aggregation Nexus 7000 vPC
16-way port-channel
Po160 Po20
4-way port-channel L2 Access Nexus 5000
vPC Peer Link LACP Channel (2x10 GigE) vPC Peer-Keepalive (GigE)
20 flows @1000 pps

Cisco Confidential
20 flows @1000 pps

48
vPC on Nexus 7000

Convergence Numbers
Failover case
Failure of secondary vPC peer*
Failure Topology Failure

4.1(4) P S North-Bound: ~700 ms South-Bound: ~2.5 sec 4.2(1) North-Bound: ~50 ms. South-Bound: ~100 ms
Convergence Time Restoration

4.1(4) North-Bound: ~3 sec South-Bound: ~3.4 sec 4.2(1) North-Bound: 100 900 ms South-Bound: 1.2 -2 s 4.1(4) North-Bound:~4.5 secs South-Bound: ~5 secs 4.2(1) North-Bound: ~400 ms-1.5 s South-Bound: ~1.5 s 4.1(4) North-Bound: ~900 ms South-Bound: up to 10+ s (CSCsz88998) 4.2(1) North-Bound: 150 - 900 ms South-Bound: ~ 900 ms1.5 s
Failure of a primary vPC peer*
4.1(4)
North-Bound: ~150 ms South-Bound: ~3 sec 4.2(1) North-Bound: ~50 ms South-Bound: ~100 ms
Failover of the vPC Peer Link P S
4.1(4) North-Bound: ~1.3 s South-Bound: ~1.8 s 4.2(1) North-Bound: 100-300 ms South-Bound: 50-500 ms
NOTE: Convergence numbers may vary depending on the specific configuration (i.e. scaled number of VLANs/SVIs or HSRP groups) and traffic patterns (i.e. L2 vs L3 flows).
49
vPC on Nexus 7000

Scalability Number Improvements
Release 4.1(5) Supported Scalability 192 vPCs (2-port) with the following,
200 VLANs 200 HSRP Groups 40K MACs & 40K ARPs 10K (S,G) w. 66 OIFs (L3 sources) 3K (S,G) w. 34 OIFs (L2 sources)
Latest Ankara 4.2(1)
256 vPCs (4-port) with the following,

260 VLANs 200 SVI/HSRP Groups 40k MACs & 40K ARPs 10K (S,G) w. 66 OIFs (L3 sources) 3K (S,G) w. 64 OIFs (L2 sources)
NOTE: Supported numbers of VLANs/vPCs are NOT related to an hardware or software limit but reflect what has been currently validated by our QA. The N7k BU is planning to continuously increase these numbers as soon as new data-points become available.
Cisco Confidential
50
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


51
vPC Hands-on Lab Information

On Demand vPC Lab Overview
N7K-Aggr N7K-Aggr
Pod 1
Pod 2
N7K-1 POD 1-2 VPC
N7K-2 POD 1-2 VPC
Pod 1
Pod 2
Instructor-led hands-on lab introducing the vPC (virtual Portchannel) feature for the Nexus 7000. Participants exposed to the configuration of vPC with NX-OS. Lab needs to be manually booked through Nexus 7000 TMEs.
N7K-3 POD 3-4 VPC
N7K-4 POD 3-4 VPC
Pod 3
Pod 4
N7K-7 POD 5-6 VPC
N7K-8 POD 5-6 VPC
Pod 5
Pod 6
52
vPC Hands-on Lab Information

vPC Lab Logistics and Timing
The vPC Laboratory consists of 6 independent PODs. A group of 2 students is assigned to each Pod. Each student will configure a vPC peer device. PODs are logically independent. Two adjacent PODs are physically bound to the same Nexus. Virtual Device Contexts (VDCs) are used to define logically independent devices on the same Nexus 7010 box. The vPC Lab session is expected to be completed in around two hours.
Cisco Confidential
53
Agenda
Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services


54
Reference Material
vPC/VSS Interop Test Details
Physical Logical L3 Core
N7K-1
N7K-2
L2/L3 Aggregation Nexus 7000 vPC
Po10
E1/26 E1/25
Po100
Te1/2/1 Te2/2/1
Po100
6K-1
6K-2
L2 Access 6500 VSS
vPC Peer Link LACP Channel (2x10 GigE) vPC PeerKeepalive (GigE) VSS VSL Channel (2x10 GigE)
Cisco Confidential
55
Reference Material
vPC/VSS Interop Test Details
The following scenarios were tested:

VSS and vPC member failover and convergence Dual active scenarios and behavior Best practice guidelines for STP, L3 (NSF), Multicast
Catalyst 6500/Nexus 7000 interoperability:

Multiple ports per chassis act as one larger ether-channel
Cisco Confidential
56
Reference Material
Other Solution Tests and Recent vPC Documentation
Enterprise Solutions Engineering:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/solutions/Enterprise/Data_Center/DC_3_0/DC-3_0_IPInfra.html
Implementing Nexus 7000 in the Data Center Aggregation Layer with Services:
https://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/solutions/Enterprise/Data_Center/nx_7000_dc.html
Configuration Guide for Object Tracking Feature:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/partner/docs/switches/datacenter/sw/4_2/nxos/interfaces/configuration/guide/if_vPC.html#wp1530133
vPC white Paper:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/switches/ps9441/ps9402/white_paper_c11516396.html
Cisco Confidential
57

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Nexus 7000 virtual Port-Channel

Best Practices & Design Guidelines

Roberto Mari Technical Marketing Engineer

Data Center Business Unit

November 2009 version 1.1

2009 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.

Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services

Convergence and Scalability vPC Hands-on Lab Information Reference Material

Feature Overview & Terminology

Available on current and future hardware for M1 and D1 generation cards.

Feature Overview & Terminology

vPC peer a vPC switch, one of a pair

vPC peer vPC

vPC vPC member member port port

vPC non-vPC device

2009 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.

Building a vPC Domain

vPC member port

Building a vPC Domain

Recommendations (strong ones!)

*It is Best Practice to split vPC and non-vPC

Building a vPC Domain

2009 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.

Building a vPC Domain

Peer Link with Single 10G Module Object Tracking

rhs-7k-1(config-vpc-domain)# track <object>

Building a vPC Domain

3 second hold timeout on peer-link loss

Should NOT be routed over the Peer-Link

Building a vPC Domain

Standby Management Interface Active Management Interface

2009 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.

Building a vPC Domain

vPC member port

Building a vPC Domain

Layer 3 and vPC

vPC and Services

Convergence and Scalability vPC Hands-on Lab Information Reference Material

Attaching to a vPC domain

ALWAYS dual attach devices to a vPC Domain!!!

Attaching to a vPC Domain

Access Device Requirements

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Attaching to a vPC Domain

Attaching to a vPC Domain

2. Attached via VDC/Secondary Switch

Primary vPC Secondary vPC

3. Secondary ISL Port-Channel

4. Single Attached to vPC Device

Attaching to a vPC Domain

vPC Design principles

1. All devices Dual Attached via vPC

2. Separate vPC and STP VLANs

Secondary STP Root

3. Overlapping vPC and STP VLANs

Attaching to a vPC Domain

vPC peer side load-balancing is LOCAL to the peer

Nexus 7000 16-way port channel Nexus 5000

* Possible with any device supporting

Attaching to a vPC Domain

Nexus 5000 16-port port-channel support introduced in 4.1(3)N1(1a) release

Layer 3 and vPC