channeling 10 Gbps interfaces?

Sentia NOC · ‎12-18-2007

Hi all,

Between Cisco Catalyst 65xx, running SUP720, which is the way to go when reaching bandwidth beyond 10Gbps? Portchannel - or will that leave issues?

It should be mentioned that it sould be possible to carry vlan traffic across theese links.

Any advice would be nice :-D

Regards,

Philip

Jon Marshall · ‎12-18-2007

Hi Philip

6500 will support etherchannel on 10Gbps interfaces so you should be fine with this configuration. Obviously if you want to carry muliple vlans then make it a L2 trunk link.

The other alternative you have is to create a separate link between the switches and control the vlans that go across each link to avoid any STP loops but etherchannel is an easier way to go.

HTH

Jon

bvsnarayana03 · ‎12-18-2007

Hi jon,

My understanding was that L3 channels & trunks help in overcome the STP loops in topology.

but you were very specific in mentioning the use L2 trunk on channel (Obviously if you want to carry muliple vlans then make it a L2 trunk link.

). Any reasons for that?

Thanks.

Jon Marshall · ‎12-18-2007

Hi

I should have been more specific in what i said it think.

If you want to carry multiple vlans at layer 2 ie. you want to be able to switch at layer 2 between your 2 switches then you need to make that link a layer 2 trunk link which can be run over a single link or a layer 2 etherchannel.

If you are happy to route the vlans between the switches then you can make it a layer 3 etherchannel but then vlan 10 on switch 1 will not be the same vlan as vlan 10 on switch 2 and vlan 10 would need to use separate IP subnets on each switch.

Etherchannels do help in overcoming STP topology limitations in that layer 2 etherchannels are seen as one link by STP rather than multiple individual links and obviously with L3 etherchannels STP doesn't come into the equation.

HTH

Jon