[c-nsp] Cisco 10G gear

[Justin M. Streiner]

On Sat, 17 Jan 2015, Chris Knipe wrote:

> I have a 6500 that I want to equip with 10G.  I am as confused as I can be
> in terms of what is / is not supported.

There is also the question of what is or soon will be end-of-life.  I 
don't know what kind of budget you have to work with, but the Sup720 and 
many of the 6700-series linecards are end-of-sale.

> I am looking at the WS-X6704-10G cards -
> http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/solutions/collateral/data-center-virtualization
> /data-center-switching/net_business_benefit0900aecd805348f3.html and I'm
> mainly after the 4 port cards for a costing point of view, as well as to not
> have contention across the ports.  I will deploy 2 x 4 port cards in the
> 6500, and traffic will be at ~5Gbps or so per port.

Packets per second is generally more important than bits per second, in 
terms of forwarding performance.

> Using a standard SUP720 and the default forwarding (CFC) - would this be a
> workable solution, or would distributed forwarding (DCF3A/DFC3B/DFC3BXL) be
> *required*?  Also for distributed forwarding, would a SUP720-3B(XL) (or
> higher) be required?

If you really want or need to use the Sup720, go with at least the 3BXL. 
Not knowing what the overall design goals are, or what kind of budget you 
have, it's tough to recommend a solution.

I've used 6500s with Sup720/3BXLs and various 6700-series linecards for 
many years.  It's been a very reliable platform, but it is getting rather 
long in the tooth.

jms