Nexus N9K - 9372-E / 9372 ( non -E )

jparsons.itd1 · ‎02-08-2017

Hey,

So been seeing the -E switches appear in our inventory lately and been rolling a few out. Run into an "ohhh can I do that..is it safe...." It dose work i know that much and i saw no issues.

So normally- when I say normally I mean I've never been put in this scenario so I hope someone may know.

Can you run a 9372-E and 9372 non -E in a vPC together is it supported and is it safe. I could not find a requirement on vPC for matching the hardware.

and to take it further.. unlike the Arista where MLAG refuses to bring the peer up on a mismatch of software these guys seems to peer fine. I did upgrade them to the same in the end.

Thanks,

Jack

Reza Sharifi · ‎02-08-2017

Hi,

vPC peering an E switch with a non-E switch should not be an issue.

HTH

weylin.piegorsch · ‎08-03-2017

"The Cisco Nexus 9372PX-E is a minor hardware revision of the Cisco Nexus 9372PX. Enhancements in the hardware are transparent in Cisco^® NX-OS Software mode and offer feature parity."
http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/switches/nexus-9000-series-switches/datasheet-c78-736967.html

Having said that: BE CAREFUL when pairing device into a vPC pair. I once tried putting a 5548UP and a 5596UP together into a vPC pair, it was unstable and actually managed to cause a ripple effect throughout the datacenter, destabilizing other vPC pairs (even though the vPC domain IDs were different!!!).

vPC pair MUST be hardware matched, to a certain level. As part of the vPC startup process, CFSoE exchanges compatibility information either over the peer link (or over FabricPath in a N7k / N5k "vPC+" scenario) to verify you won't break things. The Nexus 9372PX and 9372PX-E are *probably* sufficiently close that they would have no issues (the -E thing relates to enhanced ACI features, since you're asking vPC I know you're talking NX-OS mode).

Is it a supported mechanism? Hard to say. Is it a god idea? No.