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Redundant C3560E-24 w/ possible VLANs

ktcisg
Level 1
Level 1

Hey guys,

I am going to be setting up a network w/ Gigabit switches. The vendor requires that the switches be fully redundant with one working uplink and one standby. I also may be setting up VLANs w/ security rules. I am looking at Cisco Catalyst WS-C3560E-24TD-SD switches for this, as the fabric looks good for my needs. Can you guys provide any info as to how this is setup or if these switches are even capable of  this?

Thanks!                     

4 Replies 4

Jon Marshall
Hall of Fame
Hall of Fame

ktcisg@kaplantel.net

Hey guys,

I am going to be setting up a network w/ Gigabit switches. The vendor requires that the switches be fully redundant with one working uplink and one standby. I also may be setting up VLANs w/ security rules. I am looking at Cisco Catalyst WS-C3560E-24TD-SD switches for this, as the fabric looks good for my needs. Can you guys provide any info as to how this is setup or if these switches are even capable of  this?

Thanks!                     

Not really enough information.

Are you talking about just 2 switches and the clients are directly connected to the switches ?

When you talk about uplinks, uplinks to what ?

Generally speaking for servers/clients you can setup HSRP so one switch is active for a vlan and the other standby and then have the reverse for another vlan. Both switches are active in forwarding traffic.

The 3560s are L3 capable switches so they should be able to do most things you want eg. NAT is not available on these switches for example, but without a bit more info, especially how many switches, how they will be interconnected, what will be connected to the switches and what the uplinks are for it's difficult to be more precise.

Jon

rtjensen4
Level 4
Level 4

Hello,

Yes, the 3560 is very capable of redundant uplinks and there are a couple of ways to do it depending on your network setup.

What part of the network is your 3560 located in? If it's an access/distribution layer, do you have a dual-core design? What are you "uplinking" to? Anothe switch? a router?

You could:

  • Assuming a 3560 is access/distribution layer w/Dual core: run a connection to both core switches. Spanning tree will work its magic and put one of the uplinks into forwarding state, the other into blocking. When the forwarding link fails, the blocking will transition to forwarding and take over. There will be a short delay, but there are some spanning-tree optimizations that can make it much quicker.
  • Assuming 3560 is access/distribution w/Single core Option 1: Run two connections from 3560 to the core switch. Spanning tree will do the same as in the previous point, allowing 1 link to be active at a time. Doesn't really give you much redundancy though. if either switch fails, there's downtime anyway.
  • Assuming 3560 is access/distribution w/Single core Option 2: Run two connections from 3560 to core and bundle together as an etherchannel. Etherchannel allows both links to be active and doubles your bandwidth, but again, this setup doesn't provide much redundancy.
  • Assuming the 3560 is in a "core" role, just run multiple links to your downstream switches.

As for VLAN security, you can use VACLs to control traffic at the MAC address level, or the 3560 can also do inter-vlan routing which would allow you do filter at layer 3 referencing a regular ACL.

HTH

I am thinking they will be core switches. They will be transporting voice traffic as well as management and web functions. I have attached a diagram of how i vision the topology will be.

Thanks again

Also, would I just use portfast on all interfaces? I will be connecting the two switches together with a cat6 i would imagine. The metaswitch and calix will have redundant GigE cards for failover, one will be active and one standby. I appreciate the help guys.

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