Cisco® announces three new Cisco Catalyst® blade switches for the Dell M1000e. At the entry level is the new Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3032 for Dell, and at the mid-high end are two configurations for the new Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3130 for Dell. These switches provide high-performance, cost-effective, and scalable solutions that can help simplify the network and meet growing bandwidth needs for Dell M1000e customers.
The Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3032 offers an entry-level Gigabit switch for the Dell M1000e that helps customers connect servers to the external network using Gigabit connectivity. It offers all the key benefits of deploying Cisco Catalyst switches, which are consistent feature rich end-to-end features, and simpler management and operations.
With the new Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3130 products, Cisco introduces a unique technology called the Virtual Blade Switch (VBS). VBS technology connects individual physical switches within a rack with a special cable and treats them as one logical switch, providing a number of benefits:
• Simplifies data center management because there are fewer switches to manage
• Increases bandwidth up to 160 Gbps from each virtual blade switch in a server rack, and customers can double bandwidth from each server by using Cisco EtherChannel®
• Enables servers to communicate within the rack without I/O going out of the rack, and customers can share uplinks across multiple switches in the VBS for a scalable and cost-effective solution
• Uses the same feature-rich Cisco IOS® Software, MIBs, and management tools as the rest of the Cisco Catalyst products, simplifying operation and management
Ordering Information
Here is an overview of the three switches:
• Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3032 for Dell:
– Supports up to 8 Gigabit Ethernet uplink ports: 4 10/100/1000BASE-T ports and 4 Small Form-Factor Pluggable (SFP) Gigabit Ethernet ports (using Cisco TwinGig Converter Modules in the X2 slots)
• Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3130G for Dell
– Supports up to 8 Gigabit Ethernet uplink ports: 4 10/100/1000BASE-T ports and 4 SFP Gigabit Ethernet ports (using Cisco TwinGig Converter Modules in the X2 slots)
– Provides 2 VBS ports for virtualizing up to 8 switches across multiple chassis with the same rack
• Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3130X for Dell
– Supports up to 4 10/100/1000BASE-T ports and two X2 10 Gigabit Ethernet ports
– Provides 2 VBS ports for virtualizing up to 8 switches across multiple chassis with the same rack
Table 1 provides part numbers and product descriptions for these switches.
Table 1. Ordering Information for Cisco Catalyst Blade Switches for Dell
Available with Cisco IOS Software and the IP Base image, the Cisco Catalyst Blade Switch 3130 products offer a complete set of intelligent services to deliver security, quality of service (QoS), and high availability in the server farm access environment. The IP Base feature set includes advanced QoS, a suite of security features, rate-limiting, access control lists (ACLs), and basic static and Routing Information Protocol (RIP) routing capability. Optionally, customers can upgrade the switch software to IP Services or Advanced IP Services. The IP Services feature set provides a richer set of enterprise-class features, including advanced hardware-based IP unicast and multicast routing: Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP), Open Shortest Path First (OSPF), Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), Protocol Independent Multicast (PIM), and so on. The Advanced IP Services feature set offers IPv6 routing.
Product Availability
The new Cisco Catalyst blade switches begin shipping in January 2008.
Service and Support
Cisco SMARTnet® maintenance contracts are available for the Cisco Catalyst blade switches.
