Dell VEP/VMWare Edge/Velo Cloud SD-WAN/VeraCloud VEP1400/VEP1400-X firewall units

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Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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Some headway on the Dell Edge 610. I have finally received my RJ45 sfp connectors and some great news... SFP1 is directly connected to IX3 and SFP2 is directly connected to IX2 for myself... The rest of the RJ45 connectors are still dead in Opnsense. At least I have a stable connection to the box now over ethernet. I will see if I can ssh in and add the script files to bring the rest of the RJ45 connectors to life.

For the moment I an just running off a live disk. I will report back once I have the B+M key ssd and if it functions in the LTE slot
 
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oneplane

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Jul 23, 2021
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Some headway on the Dell Edge 610. I have finally received my RJ45 sfp connectors and some great news... SFP1 is directly connected to IX3 and SFP2 is directly connected to IX2 for myself... The rest of the RJ45 connectors are still dead in Opnsense. At least I have a stable connection to the box now over ethernet. I will see if I can ssh in and add the script files to bring the rest of the RJ45 connectors to life.

For the moment I an just running off a live disk. I will report back once I have the B+M key ssd and if it functions in the LTE slot
I think those are the defaults (on an unconfigured switch chip), which is neat. Probably also why the examples script just attached the copper ports to the SFPs to let the basic functionality always work. Can you also get SFP details in pfSense? Or does it not have communication to the modules.
 

Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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I will check tonight after work if Pfsense boots and links to the sfp ports. I think it comes back to the lattice.

As for my dell it has a atom C3308 which has 4 intergrated 2.5/1gb ethernet interfaces. I think the IX2&3 links are going via the CPLD to the sfp ports and IX0&1 are linked to the switch chip and Fluffy bones mapped IX0 and IX1 to the switch ports in his post.
 

oneplane

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Jul 23, 2021
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I also think the I2C bus is connected to the lattice; one of the startup commands for enabling SFP power is targeted at the Lattice I2C address; that said, it could also default to 'automatic' and if no commands are issued, it would just power up the SFP modules as soon as they are hot-plugged.

I'm looking into the Marvell driver code to see if we can get it to report our upstream ports back to the OS; if it turns out ix0,1,2,3 are all connected to the chip that would be very different from the topology than expected.
 

Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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I've done a boot into the pfsense installer and both the SFP are live, I also managed to finally install it to a memory pen...

I've also done some further digging on my spesific model... FCC IO internal pictures of Dell Edge 610 with Atom C3308 CPU (page 14 onwards)

1686076216525.png
It has a marvell 88E6190-TLA2 switch module that takes a maximum of two links from the CPU which can be up to 10gb ports and in my case two 2.5gb links from the CPU.

1686076615717.png
This is also very intersting. It looks like the other eeproms we saw in the board could hold some configuration data and that is how the buttons swiched it on the Dell edge 620, 640 and 680 models.
1686078423638.png

From this I'm concluding that IX0 and IX1 is linked to the switch chip and the IX2 and IX3 is directly linked to the SFP ports on the Dell edge 610. As for the Dell 620, 640 and 680 that has the slightly different architecture seems to have the IX0 and IX1 connected to the SFP ports and IX2 and IX03 to the switch chip.
1686080062170.png
on the Edge 610 the IX0 and IX1 is currently dead as a door knob on Pfsense. I will switch to the plus edition once I have the SSD and confirmed that it works in the LTE slot.

1686080175362.png

I've also found this PFsense video about built in switch setup

We are slowly making progress in understanding the Dell Edge 610/620/640/680 and VEP1425/1445/1485
 
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Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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I've also noted that this is the exact same switch chip used in the Netgate XG7100 device...

1686081510317.png
 

Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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Off the wall question. Did anyone else manage to get a 1gb ethernet sfp RJ45 module to work in a Dell Edge 620/640/680 or VEP1425/1445/1485? Or does it need to be a 10gb SFP+ RJ45 module? As pfsense sees the module but it does not assign a mac address to the module. The mac is just blank on the Edge 640. But the module works on the Edge 610.
 

eloich

New Member
Jan 12, 2021
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Off the wall question. Did anyone else manage to get a 1gb ethernet sfp RJ45 module to work in a Dell Edge 620/640/680 or VEP1425/1445/1485? Or does it need to be a 10gb SFP+ RJ45 module? As pfsense sees the module but it does not assign a mac address to the module. The mac is just blank on the Edge 640. But the module works on the Edge 610.
Got a 620 and I've been using cheap 10Gtek SFP adapters (some10G and some 1G, in both copper and OC version) and it seems to just work. I don't have any other brand to play with at the moment so I cannot say if compatibility should be universal. Hope that helps.
 
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oneplane

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Jul 23, 2021
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While I haven't had much time to play with the hardware this week, I did find the optics tool from Dell to be rather small, so perhaps a quick decompilation might show if it is taking to the SFP+ over I2C, MDIO or in-band. If the FPGA is in between the cages/LEDs and the SoC it might just be forwarding the traffic, but if it's not the PIC might be messing with the communication. Either way, if both Linux and BSD can read the serial numbers natively we're good to go.

I've put up some eBay alerts hoping to get some of the Edge models, might make comparison easier between what I dumped from the chips, what Brood has, and whatever else is out there. I should however note that while the C3000 has plenty of power (and DPDK support as well as QAT!), it isn't exactly the endgame SoC due it its age. It can hoever still be a great deal compared to Topton's stuff if you need 10G connectivity.
 
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Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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It looks like the modules I have works with the Dell610 but not the 640. So I dont know if its a module issue, driver, setup or physical compatability issue on the 640.

This is when I have them plugged into the 610 in pfsense when typing ifconfig in the command prompt.
1686382144242.png

This is what I get when I plug it in to the 640 in pfsense when typing ifconfig in the command prompt.
1686382921275.png
It looks like the moduels are not getting a mac address assigned in the ether portion.
1686384486664.png
Also in the assignment portion of pfsense we see the following:

All the mac addresses are the same but just increments by 1 each time but 4 and 5 is missing for ix0 and Ix1. Would this be due to a module compatability issue?

It does link in windows but again no connectivity but it shows a link ps there are no lights on the sfp cages on the 640.
1686383481381.png

Does any one know why pfsense would not assign a mac to the modules?

I'll keep a eye out for a couple of 10G modules in case that is the issue... not that I need them at the moment as I dont have a 10g switch or any 10g devices only one 2.5g device.

Is there something I am missing? The only difference was that the dell 610 had pfsense installed while the modules were in place and the 640 didn't have any modules when I installed pfsense and the obvious underlying architecture difference where the 610 only have 1gbe and the 640 has 10gbe.

EDIT: As soon as I unplug the modueles it instantly reassigns the correct mac addresses to ix0 and ix1... so i'm lost
 
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Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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So I finally received the B+M key SSD and I can confirm that mechanically it fits and screws down perfectly... but from a usability stand point... its not detected by the bios so it looks like the B keyed slot on the top is a no go for B + M keyed SSDs
 

oneplane

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Jul 23, 2021
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I think the slot needs to be powered on by the FPGA or GPIO, I did see some note about LTE Power in one of the XML or CFG files. If it's persistent (like the PIC timer) that could work.
 

Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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@oneplane did you make any headway with the Edge 610 to make all the ports always on and avaiable without needing to enable it each time?
 
Aug 2, 2015
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Recently got my hands on a few units of the Dell Edge 640, they all seem brand new unused in box.

Downloaded the DiagOS installer, installed, and even ran ufw 2.4 and the SSD firmware update.
So updated to:
BIOS image version: 3.50.0.9-19
CPLD image version: 0x29
PIC image version: v20P

I also found a copy of the VMware SD-WAN 5.4.0 edge update package file: edge-imageupdate-EDGE5X0-x86_64-5.4.0.0-99120269-R5400-20231009-GA-6d8f886039.zip

Does anyone know if the edge-imageupdate would have newer BIOS/CPLD/PIC version? I can't figure out how to manually install the edge update package without having the VMware SD-WAN Orchestrator backend.
 

Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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You will need to explore the zip file to see what is included. There are a possiblility that there are more more upto date bios and CLPD/PIC images but you also run the risk of running into the boot loop issue where the pic watchdog keeps rebooting the system. So I would personally stick with the DiagOS updates as it transforms the 640 into a VEP1445. I am currently running the Edge 640 and its working well. I just need to try and get the SFP cages to work by pressing the internal buttons but all the other copper ports are working with out any issues.

Where did you find the SD-WAN 540 update package? as I am working on a edge 610 and I am trying to get it updated as the DiagOS is not working for the 610
 
Aug 2, 2015
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@Brood - What OS are you running on your Edge 640?

I'm testing vyos and ESXi 8.0U2 on it. My first unit I did the ufw 2.4 BIOS/CPLD/PIC updates and naturally the watchdog no longer triggers reboot. On my second unit, without BIOS/CPLD/PIC updates and the watchdog causes reboot but after I opened the case and pressed both buttons by the NIC ports, it stopped triggering watchdog reboots.
 
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Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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I'm running Opnsense at the moment on the 640. Do you have SFP to copper modules as I can see the interfaces in the OS but my SPF ports does not power up when a cable is plugged in. I might have pressed to buttons next to the NIC ports one too many times... but as its running my network I am not ready to take everything down and mess with it till they are up and running.

As for the 610 I have the oppicite the SFP cages are working but the copper ports are dead.

Did you get the 640s for a decent price as I am looking to get another 640 or 680
 
Aug 2, 2015
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Oh damn... those buttons sure are mysterious and finicky!

I have 1000BASE-LX and 10GBASE-LR transceivers but no copper modules at all. I was thinking of getting a 10GBASE-T copper SFP+ transceiver from Fiberstore if I do sign up for 10Gbps fiber broadband for home in the coming months.
 

Brood

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Apr 15, 2023
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I have a fibrestore 1gb copper module and it works a treat in the 610 so I know it works but dead as a dodo in the 640. My plan was to get a SFP GPON module to replace the Nokia-ONT G-010G-R Optical Fibre GPON Terminal to get rid of the fibre to copper conversion and have the fibre directly into the 640 to try and reduce latency further. My unloaded ping is 12ms and my loaded bufferbloat is currently below 5ms.