[c-nsp] Cisco 3012 IBM Blade Switch Configurations?

[ChrisSerafin]

Thanks.....running into alot of issues with these devices....I have one 
2960 upstream with etherchannel trunks to each blade switch. I see 
connectivity loss between a server on a blade when all 4 etherchannels 
are up to the other 3 blades switches. When I shut down the other 3 
etherchannels to the other blade switches, the connectivity gets 
restored after a minute.....switching loop? Is the virtual backplane 
creating loops? Here are my configs:

2960:
spanning-tree mode pvst
spanning-tree extend system-id
!
vlan internal allocation policy ascending
!
interface Port-channel1
 description [ Etherchannel Between 2960 Switches ]
 switchport mode trunk
!
interface Port-channel2
 description [ Etherchannel to BL01 ]
 switchport mode trunk
!
interface Port-channel3
 description { Etherchannel to BL02 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
!
interface Port-channel4
 description [ Etherchannel to BL03 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
!
interface Port-channel5
 description { Etherchannel to BL04 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/1
 description [ Etherchannel to 2960-02 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 channel-group 1 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/2
 description [ Etherchannel to 2960-02 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 channel-group 1 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/3
 description [ Etherchannel to BL01 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 channel-group 2 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/4
 description [ Etherchannel to BL01 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 channel-group 2 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/5
 description [ Etherchannel to BL02 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
 channel-group 3 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/6
 description [ Etherchannel to BL02 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
 channel-group 3 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/7
 description [ Etherchannel to BL03 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
 channel-group 4 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/8
 description [ Etherchannel to BL03 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
 channel-group 4 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/9
 description [ Etherchannel to BL04 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
 channel-group 5 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/10
 description [ Etherchannel to BL04 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 shutdown
 channel-group 5 mode on
!


And each blade is configured like this:
spanning-tree mode pvst
spanning-tree extend system-id
!
vlan internal allocation policy ascending
!
!
!
interface Port-channel2
 description [ Etherchannel to 2960-01 ]
 switchport mode trunk
!
interface FastEthernet0
 ip address 192.168.70.21 255.255.255.0
 no ip route-cache cef
 no ip route-cache
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/15
 description [ Etherchannel to 2960-01 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 channel-group 2 mode on
!
interface GigabitEthernet0/16
 description [ Etherchannel to 2960-01 ]
 switchport mode trunk
 channel-group 2 mode on
!
interface Vlan1
 ip address 10.90.91.21 255.255.255.0
!
ip default-gateway 10.90.91.1
ip classless
ip route 192.168.70.0 255.255.255.0 FastEthernet0
ip http server
!
!




Thanks for all your help on these guys!














































Justin C. Darby wrote:
> Hi Chris,
>
> I strongly suggest if you want to keep a simple mode of operation you 
> use a feature on these things that configures them independently of 
> the Bladecenter Advanced Management Module.
>
> It's hard to find in the docs, but, what you want is "platform 
> chassis-management protected-mode". The AMM has to support it (the 
> switch will tell you if it does not and then you need a firmware 
> upgrade to the AMM), but if it does, you can change the settings the 
> AMM is configuring your switch for involuntarily (which has been an 
> issue for us in the past). If you configure using this, these things 
> work just like the catalyst switches you'd expect, without mucking 
> around with the AMM.
>
> Good luck (I've got a lot of these things, you'll need it).
>
> Justin
>
> ChrisSerafin wrote:
>> What MST config do you suggest and on what if not all of the switches?
>>
>> The docs from Cisco go into crazy configurations, and I only need 
>> basic STP functions: 2 core switches with an etherchannel link from 
>> each of them to each blade switch.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> David Hughes wrote:
>>>
>>> On 17/02/2009, at 5:21 AM, ChrisSerafin wrote:
>>>
>>>> That brings up a good point about STP. If I have 1 etherchannel 
>>>> going from each switch blade to each upstream switch, will the 
>>>> switches detect the loops or do I need to manually configure this? 
>>>> Thanks for your comments!
>>>
>>> The blade switches operate as separate switches and can be viewed as 
>>> if they were your normal 29xx or 35xx access switch depending on the 
>>> CIGESM you buy (well, with a couple of caveats about their 
>>> management interfaces).  If the switches are connected to your 
>>> network via a single etherchannel then there's no possibility of a 
>>> loop - other than a mis-configured etherchannel.  You don't get 
>>> loops but you don't get any redundancy at the network layer.  In 
>>> this setup I assume you are using some form of NIC teaming and 
>>> failover on the blades themselves for redundancy.  That's not going 
>>> to pick up a failed uplink on your primary switching path as most 
>>> teaming drivers only look at link state on the NIC.
>>>
>>> If you are following a "normal" dual attached model where each 
>>> access switch (be it a top of rack switch or a blade switch module) 
>>> is uplinked to 2 different switches then you get link redundancy but 
>>> naturally need STP.  If you are running dense virtualisation or vm 
>>> server farms then the STP you should be running is MST.
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>>
>>> David
>>> ...
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>>>
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