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Brocade ICX Series (cheap & powerful 10gbE/40gbE switching)

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Smbaker

New Member
Oct 9, 2019
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there's a hidden debug command to get raw fan RPM, but I can't remember if it works on the 6450:

dm fan-speed
Thanks, I tried that though I'm not sure if the answer is useful:

Code:
SSH@ICX6450-24P-Router#dm fan-speed   
All fans in Low speed (0x83)
Not sure if 0x83 is the sensed RPM, the output PWM, or something else. Will be interesting to check it if/when it revs up to speed 2.
 

juey

Member
Oct 1, 2018
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Germany
I might, I haven't gotten that far with mine yet.

I did find and order a suitable set of fans.. These are 7.7CFM @ 21DB, have the RD output and best of all available from a reputable seller.

MF40201V2-1000U-A99 Sunon Fans | Fans, Thermal Management | DigiKey
You can also buy Noctua NF-A4x20 FLX fans, i have modded 3 6450-24p with these without any issue, one switch is pulling 60W of power over PoE and the fan speed stays at 1. I have one switch running next to me, its dead quiet.

6450fanswap2.jpg
 
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tojoski

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Sep 22, 2019
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You can also buy Noctua NF-A4x20 FLX fans, i have modded 3 6450-24p with these without any issue, one switch is pulling 60W of power over PoE and the fan speed stays at 1. I have one switch running next to me, its dead quiet.
I thought I read here that the Noctuas wouldn't start at the lowest fan level 4.5v?

I was also under the impression that it needed the locked rotor detection.
 

infoMatt

Active Member
Apr 16, 2019
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I thought I read here that the Noctuas wouldn't start at the lowest fan level 4.5v?

I was also under the impression that it needed the locked rotor detection.
These switches (and for what matters, almost all the "enterprise-y" equipment that I've used/seen/dealt with) boot with the fans at full blast, and throttle them down when the OS takes full control, so no problem if the fans cannot start at 4V or so - they do need of course to be able to maintain the rotation at low voltage, not to overcome the initial inertia ;)
 

fohdeesha

Kaini Industries
Nov 20, 2016
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Thanks, I tried that though I'm not sure if the answer is useful:

Code:
SSH@ICX6450-24P-Router#dm fan-speed  
All fans in Low speed (0x83)
Not sure if 0x83 is the sensed RPM, the output PWM, or something else. Will be interesting to check it if/when it revs up to speed 2.
ok yeah I thought I vaguely remembered the output being weird on the 6450, on the 6610 it's just RPM:


Code:
telnet@ICX1(config-if-e1000-1/1/20)#dm fan-speed
FRU 1 Fan 1 Speed at 8490 RPM.
FRU 1 Fan 2 Speed at 8766 RPM.
0x83 is 131 in decimal, so I have no idea what it would be. Was thinking maybe a scale from 0-100% PWM but clearly not
 

Smbaker

New Member
Oct 9, 2019
23
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It could be 0-255, that might make sense.

I could go stick a piece of painter's tape over the fan outlets, let the unit warm up a bit, and see if the values change.
The painter's tape experiment has concluded:

Code:
SSH@ICX6450-24P-Router#dm fan-speed
All fans in High speed (0xff)
I think this is PWM, on a 0-255 scale, or it's something being fed into an 8-bit DAC to drive the fan voltage, whatever. 0x83 = about half, 0xFF = wide open. Mystery solved, though I do wish it told me the RPM instead.

Oh, and even these "quiet" Sunons can be heard across the room when they're running wide open.
 

zanechua

Member
May 6, 2016
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You can also buy Noctua NF-A4x20 FLX fans, i have modded 3 6450-24p with these without any issue, one switch is pulling 60W of power over PoE and the fan speed stays at 1. I have one switch running next to me, its dead quiet.
I would not recommend the Noctua's... I made the mistake of buying Noctua's 40mm's and that turned out to be a bad idea. They just don't produce enough cfm to be able to cool anything. They are great fans but probably the wrong use case.


Oh, and even these "quiet" Sunons can be heard across the room when they're running wide open.
I have a ICX7450 coming and I have a ton of 40mm fans... Onus to me trying to make everything silent on a new build of mine. I'll probably try them out if the ICX7450 is too noisy. I do need to check the PSU to make sure they can handle the fans though in terms of power consumption.
 
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Todd F

New Member
Sep 25, 2019
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Good timing for this part of the thread. I recently received a ICX7250. I ordered 2x Noctua A4x20-FLX. At boot, these spun up no problem, but once the system was booted, the fans would come to a stop and the system would reboot due to both failed fans. These run very quiet at 12V so just running them at max voltage would be acceptable, but you'd still need at least 1 fan going so the system understood there was at least 1 working fan. I played with the idea of ordering some PWM generator to trick the switch, but that seemed a bit fiddly and I'd need to get out the o-scope and make measurements.

So on to Digikey I went. I found contenders with high RPM @ 12V but <= 40dB. Stock fans are ~55dB. I wanted to try fans with higher RPM to have the best chance of fooling FastIron into thinking it had the correct fans installed so I wouldn't see them failed. I'll give the relevant specs then my thoughts.

Sunon MF40101VX-1000U-G99:
- 10mm thick vs 28mm for originals
- 'super high' speed fan,
- 4.5 min voltage range on the sheet. Once started, I could run this to ~4V.
- 8500 RPM
- 9.9 CFM
- 31.4 db(A)
- $7.66

Mechatronics MR4020X12B1-RSR:
- 20mm thick
- No min voltage specified, once started, I could run this to ~4V.
- 12,000 RPM
- 17.2 CFM
- 41.0 dB(A)
- $9.60


Both fans operate normally and the system see them operating properly. Unlike the Noctua fans which were reported as 'Failed'. This Sunon is nearly silent in Speed 1, Speed 2 isn't bad either. Air flow is... OK. The Mechatronics fan is fairly loud on boot and reasonable in Speed 1. It's not silent but the airflow is pretty good. I don't feel like it's starving the switch for air movement.

I'm not sure if I want to try out more fans since I'll have a fleet of 40mm fans with no real use for them. I think many here can sympathize with the need to have things 'just right.' If I did try a few more, I might look at Delta Electronics AFB0412HHB-F00 (11.5CFM @ 32dB(A)), Sunon MF40201VX-1000U-G99 (10.8 CFM @ 37.5dbA).
 

tojoski

New Member
Sep 22, 2019
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Well the fans I ordered from Digikey are only 2-wire and don't have the connector. #facepalm

Can anyone confirm whether these need the RPM type output, or the RD output (rotation detection)?
 

Thomas H

Member
Dec 2, 2017
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Picked up a ICX-6450 unit on eBay. Do I have a defective unit with PoE problem?

From web GUI:
Under Inline Power Statistics, I see four "PD Detection Fault"

From console (reload):
Code:
Stack unit 1 PS 1, Internal Power supply detected and up.

Stack unit 1 PS 1, Internal Power supply detected and up.
PoE: Stack unit 1 PS 1, Internal Power supply  with 740000 mwatts capacity is up
PoE Info: Adding new 54V capacity of 740000 mW, total capacity is 740000, total free capacity is 740000
PoE Info: PoE module 1 of Unit 1 on ports 1/1/1 to 1/1/48 detected. Initializing....
PoE Event Trace Log Buffer for 2000 log entries allocated
PoE Event Trace Logging enabled...
PoE Info: PoE module 1 of Unit 1 initialization is done.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/25. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/26. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/27. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/28. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/29. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/30. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/31. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/32. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/33. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/34. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/35. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/36. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/37. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/38. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/39. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/40. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/41. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/42. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/43. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/44. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/45. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/46. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/47. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/48. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/21.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/5.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/44.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/42.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/36.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/40.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/38.
 

klui

Well-Known Member
Feb 3, 2019
824
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.... I ordered 2x Noctua A4x20-FLX.....
A long time ago I replaced the fans of an Extreme switch with these Noctuas. Fast forward maybe 2-3 years later, the switch starting failing due to bulging caps. I'm not sure if it was due to decreased airflow or what but I'm not as gung-ho in replacing fans anymore. In that same environment, I ran a Nortel 5520 without any issues on the stock fans. Louder for sure but ambient is in the upper 80s-low 90s during the summer. I'm probably not going to deploy the ICX6610 or EX4200 anytime soon since the S2500 works just as well for my current needs and the S2500 is noticeably quieter than the 5520.

On the other hand, I replaced the fan of a Digi CM 32 and it's been working great for close to a decade.
 
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fohdeesha

Kaini Industries
Nov 20, 2016
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Picked up a ICX-6450 unit on eBay. Do I have a defective unit with PoE problem?

From web GUI:
Under Inline Power Statistics, I see four "PD Detection Fault"

From console (reload):
Code:
Stack unit 1 PS 1, Internal Power supply detected and up.

Stack unit 1 PS 1, Internal Power supply detected and up.
PoE: Stack unit 1 PS 1, Internal Power supply  with 740000 mwatts capacity is up
PoE Info: Adding new 54V capacity of 740000 mW, total capacity is 740000, total free capacity is 740000
PoE Info: PoE module 1 of Unit 1 on ports 1/1/1 to 1/1/48 detected. Initializing....
PoE Event Trace Log Buffer for 2000 log entries allocated
PoE Event Trace Logging enabled...
PoE Info: PoE module 1 of Unit 1 initialization is done.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/25. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/26. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/27. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/28. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/29. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/30. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/31. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/32. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/33. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/34. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/35. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/36. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/37. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/38. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/39. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/40. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/41. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/42. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/43. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/44. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/45. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/46. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/47. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Failed power allocation of 30000 mwatts on port 1/1/48. Will retry when more power budget.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/21.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/5.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/44.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/42.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/36.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/40.
PoE: Power enabled on port 1/1/38.

follow the update guide to update all the firmware (including PoE), and wipe the previous config, and that should go away. The previous owner tried to turn on 30W of PoE power on all 48 ports, and it's saying it's not possible to do that

edit: just noticed you also saw "PD Detection Fault" - it depends, but that could just be because of the previous config. if it still says that with an empty config after updating then yeah it's bad
 

infoMatt

Active Member
Apr 16, 2019
222
100
43
Picked up a ICX-6450 unit on eBay. Do I have a defective unit with PoE problem?

From web GUI:
Under Inline Power Statistics, I see four "PD Detection Fault"
"PD Detection Fault" should appear when you've enabled PoE output on the port, but there's a non-PoE device attached; my 6450 says this, at least... :D
If there's a PoE PD attached and it isn't being powered by the switch, then you've a defective PoE frontend.

PD = Powered Device

EDIT: @fohdeesha, I think you're referring to the "PoE budget allocation failed" or similar message.. But it is (almost) meaningless, at least on my 6450.. I've enabled PoE on all ports, at reload half of them fails to allocate power budget, but still come on if I plug in a PD. Weird...
Or better, it matters only if there are more device connected than the PoE power budget, in that case the switch will turn off the port with lowest priority, and amongst the same priority level, the upper port number will be turn off first.
 
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Thomas H

Member
Dec 2, 2017
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follow the update guide to update all the firmware (including PoE), and wipe the previous config, and that should go away. The previous owner tried to turn on 30W of PoE power on all 48 ports, and it's saying it's not possible to do that

edit: just noticed you also saw "PD Detection Fault" - it depends, but that could just be because of the previous config. if it still says that with an empty config after updating then yeah it's bad
I followed your update guides updating firmware and PoE. What commands do I execute to empty config? How do I do a factory reset? I browsed through the manuals and can't find this information.

edit: Went through your "Setting up Brocade ICX6450" guide again and see "factory set-default" instructions. I did it once more for good measure.

For enabling PoE, I followed Ruckus Enabling and disabling Power over Ethernet instructions:
Code:
configure terminal
interface ethernet 1/1/1 to 1/1/48
inline power
 
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psc

Member
Jun 30, 2019
53
24
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Anyone need licenses I only have 1.9660494e+39 left
Phew! Sounds like I was lucky enough to get some of the last few :)

On the one hand, I'm ecstatic about the help you're providing, and glad to trim 100+W of power draw, but on the other I fear you've cost me my remaining free time for the next few months: after 2 weeks I've only found time to update one of the two 6450s, and I've not yet started on my plan to segregate into VLANs!

Whilstling gently as I amble down the path of overkill and into madness....