Solved: SUP720 3B and 3BXL differences

johnson-richard · ‎03-22-2007

Hi,

I was just wondering if anyone new definitively what the difference is between the WS-F6K-PFC3B and WS-F6K-PFC3BXL module on the SUP720?

I know there are stated differences in the number of routes and Netflow entries etc that they can handle and the restrictions on the DFC?s, but I thought that this was a function of the amount of memory on the MSFC and Supervisor ? and you can upgrade the WS-SUP720-3b to 1GB on the SUP and MSFC.

So, will a memory upgraded 3B provide the same performance and functionality as a 3BXL?

Thanks

avmabe · ‎03-22-2007

Richard,

The biggest difference we have seen between the 3B and 3BXL was the amount of BGP routes that can be handled. The internet routing table (my view) is over 215K. The 3B TCAM cannot handle that many IPv4 routes in hardware, causing the box to send anything above (192K) to the CPU. This caused our CPU's to spike with traffic. That's bad. There is a hack where you can increase the amount of supported IPv4 routes in the 3B, but, that robs the IPv6 and multicast routes.

On the other hand, the TCAM on the 3BXL supports 1Million IPv4 + multicast + IPv6. By default the BXL supports 512K BGP IPv4 routes.

From a netflow perspective, both the 3B and 3BXL suck and still have a itty bitty ASIC that doesn't come close to what we need. It would be really nice if they would increase that ASIC size because 256K slots in the table for netflow is vastly undersized, especially considering when you turn on netflow on the box it turns it on for /every/ interface and sampling doesn't sample INTO the table, it samples OUT of the table. Hope this helps...

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ankbhasi · ‎03-22-2007

Hi Johnson,

Have a look at this link for comparison

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps708/products_data_sheet09186a0080159856.html

Basically this link explains the main difference of scalability, QoS features, Security features, MPLS features and some product specifications. Making an overview of the page the Sup720?s are very similar, with a few difference in routes and ACL?s. From hardware perspective the only difference is the amount of memory and the size of the FIB TCAM or different ASIC?s, this will give you more scalability

Also there is a difference in power requirements and heat dissipation between Supervisor Engines

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps708/products_installation_guide_chapter09186a008020e088.html

HTH

Ankur

*Pls rate all helpfull post

johnson-richard · ‎03-22-2007

So in essence, Cisco are charging an extra $12K (on list price) for 2 x 1GB sticks?

What i'm interested in is if a 3B with 1GB on the MSFC can handle the same amount of routes as a 3BXL (1mill) - i think it can?

ankbhasi · ‎03-22-2007

Hi Johnson,

The main difference between 3B and 3B XL is the size of the tcam which allows for large amounts of thing like BGP routes, QOS acl's so upgrading the memory size may hold more routes but the performance may not be the same.

HTH

Ankur

avmabe · ‎03-22-2007

Richard,

The biggest difference we have seen between the 3B and 3BXL was the amount of BGP routes that can be handled. The internet routing table (my view) is over 215K. The 3B TCAM cannot handle that many IPv4 routes in hardware, causing the box to send anything above (192K) to the CPU. This caused our CPU's to spike with traffic. That's bad. There is a hack where you can increase the amount of supported IPv4 routes in the 3B, but, that robs the IPv6 and multicast routes.

On the other hand, the TCAM on the 3BXL supports 1Million IPv4 + multicast + IPv6. By default the BXL supports 512K BGP IPv4 routes.

From a netflow perspective, both the 3B and 3BXL suck and still have a itty bitty ASIC that doesn't come close to what we need. It would be really nice if they would increase that ASIC size because 256K slots in the table for netflow is vastly undersized, especially considering when you turn on netflow on the box it turns it on for /every/ interface and sampling doesn't sample INTO the table, it samples OUT of the table. Hope this helps...

johnson-richard · ‎03-22-2007

Thanks chaps, you have really helped with this query.

qlu3 · ‎09-23-2019

Hi, man.

I think this link will help you :

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/switches/catalyst-6500-series-switches/product_data_sheet09186a0080159856.html