Interconnecting Two Virtual Chassis for Fiber-Based QFX3000-G QFabric System Control Plane Redundancy
Before you begin to interconnect two Virtual Chassis for QFX3000-G QFabric system control plane redundancy:
Install your QFabric system hardware (Director group, Interconnect devices, and Node devices). See Installing and Connecting a QFX3100 Director Device, Installing and Connecting a QFX3008-I Interconnect Device Installing and Connecting a QFX3600 or QFX3600-I Device, and Installing and Connecting a QFX3500 Device.
Install your Virtual Chassis hardware (EX4200 or EX4300 switches). For more information, see Installing and Connecting an EX4200 Switch or Installing and Connecting an EX4300 Switch.
Create two Virtual Chassis of eight EX4200-24F switch members or four EX4300-48P switch members.
Ensure that you have installed a 10-Gigabit Ethernet SFP+ transceivers in port 0 on each Virtual Chassis member uplink module (see Install a Transceiver). EX4200 uplink modules only support SFP+ transceivers installed in ports 0 and 2. For a list of supported transceivers, see Pluggable Transceivers Supported on EX4200 Switches and Pluggable Transceivers Supported on EX4300 Switches.
Instead of using optical transceivers, you can use 10-Gigabit Ethernet SFP+ direct-attach (DAC) cables. For a list of supported DAC cables, see SFP+ Direct Attach Copper Cables for EX Series Switches. The procedure below assumes you are using optical transceivers, but the port mappings in Table 1 and Table 2 also apply to DAC cables.
Ensure that you have appropriate fiber-optic cables (see Pluggable Transceivers Supported on EX4200 Switches or Pluggable Transceivers Supported on EX4300 Switches).
Ensure that you have taken the necessary precautions for safe handling of lasers (see Laser and LED Safety Guidelines and Warnings).
Use Table 1 and Table 2 to determine the fiber-based control plane Virtual Chassis-to-Virtual Chassis port mappings. Specific ports have been reserved on the Virtual Chassis to connect to each of the QFabric system device types. Such design simplifies installation and facilitates timely deployment of a QFabric system. It also permits the use of a standard Virtual Chassis configuration (see Example: Configuring a Fiber-Based Control Plane for the QFX3000-G QFabric System.
Table 1: Virtual Chassis-to-Virtual Chassis Fiber-Based Control Plane Port Assignments for EX 4200 Member 0
Member 1
Member 2
Member 3
Member 4
Member 5
Member 6
Member 7
xe-0/1/0 on EX0 to xe-0/1/0 on EX1
xe-1/1/0 on EX0 to xe-1/1/0 on EX1
xe-2/1/0 on EX0 to xe-2/1/0 on EX1
xe-3/1/0 on EX0 to xe-3/1/0 on EX1
xe-4/1/0 on EX0 to xe-4/1/0 on EX1
xe-5/1/0 on EX0 to xe-5/1/0 on EX1
xe-6/1/0 on EX0 to xe-6/1/0 on EX1
xe-7/1/0 on EX0 to xe-7/1/0 on EX1
Table 2: Virtual Chassis-to-Virtual Chassis Fiber-Based Control Plane Port Assignments for EX4300 Member 0
Member 1
Member 2
Member 3
xe-0/1/0 on EX0 to xe-0/1/0 on EX1
xe-1/1/0 on EX0 to xe-1/1/0 on EX1
xe-2/1/0 on EX0 to xe-2/1/0 on EX1
xe-3/1/0 on EX0 to xe-3/1/0 on EX1
A QFX3000-G QFabric system control plane and management network is formed by connecting the QFX Series devices in your network to two Virtual Chassis. If you are creating a fiber-based control plane network, you use eight EX4200-24F or four EX4300-48P Ethernet switches in each Virtual Chassis. For redundancy and communication, you must connect the two Virtual Chassis using the 10-Gigabit Ethernet uplink module ports configured as a link aggregation group (LAG) (see Figure 1).
To interconnect two Virtual Chassis for QFabric system control plane redundancy (see Figure 1):
Do not look directly into a fiber-optic transceiver or into the ends of fiber-optic cables. Fiber-optic transceivers and fiber-optic cables connected to transceivers emit laser light that can damage your eyes.
- Insert the cable connector into the optical transceiver
(see Figure 2).Figure 2: Connecting a Fiber-Optic Cable to an Optical Transceiver Installed in an EX Series Switch
