N3K-C3172TQ-10GT and similar Cisco switches

[WeekendWarrior]

I am looking for a TOR switch with 10Gbase-T capabilities and found N3K-C3172TQ-10GT after looking at the 3164-TQ. The former seems to be the successor to the latter with the former offering lower power per port albeit at a higher price.

I am not familiar at all with Cisco licensing issues around used equipment. My limited understanding is that if a switch is purchased from an authorized reseller, a license can be purchased or something like that.

I can't tell what, if any, licensing I would need for a 3172 switch. I don't plan to do anything exotic with this switch although I may want to stack two 3172s for redundancy and will want to do link aggregation and VLANs (simple stuff).

When trying to bootstrap my understanding through research, I found other 48-port Cisco switches where 32 ports were operational and the remaining 16 RJ45 ports required an extra license to do anything with those ports. That spooked me a bit given my lack of experience with Cisco switches and licensing issues.

Any advice on how I would know if a 3172 purchased on eBay would be usable or not would be appreciated. Pointers to good resources on this subject would be great also.

 

[blinkenlights]

Ah, you must be looking at the -10GT units for $1.5k or -XL units for $1.2k on eBay. Those are some capable switches, especially if you want to throw object models at the -XL variant. Truth is, though, they are grossly overspec'd for home use (if that is your plan) unless you have a niche ULL HFT/HPC use case or want greater hands-on experience for work. If those acronyms made no sense, you don't need a switch like this. Also pay close attention to the noise and power/heat characteristics.. 360W typical power draw with 440W max, and somewhere between 65 and 77 dBA operating noise: Cisco Nexus 3172PQ, 3172TQ, 3172TQ-32T, 3172PQ-XL, and 3172TQ-XL Switches Data Sheet

That spooked me a bit given my lack of experience with Cisco switches and licensing issues.

It sounds like you have already decided about these units. No, seriously, I am not being facetious... Cisco is well known for pulling such shenanigans, so if you are not a fan of their "game" then don't play.

It's fun to play around with discarded data center gear that once cost tens of thousands of dollars.. I just think you will find other gear performs nearly the same for less money. I went the full Brocade/Ruckus route with Chelsio and Intel cards. The Chelsio cards are cheap enough that I can play around with overclocking the ASIC and not break the bank if a card or two burns out. Overclocking, you say? You might know it better as the low-latency (-LL) profile for their T5/T6 cards

 

[WeekendWarrior]

Ah, you must be looking at the -10GT units for $1.5k or -XL units for $1.2k on eBay. Those are some capable switches, especially if you want to throw object models at the -XL variant. Truth is, though, they are grossly overspec'd for home use (if that is your plan) unless you have a niche ULL HFT/HPC use case or want greater hands-on experience for work. If those acronyms made no sense, you don't need a switch like this. Also pay close attention to the noise and power/heat characteristics.. 360W typical power draw with 440W max, and somewhere between 65 and 77 dBA operating noise: Cisco Nexus 3172PQ, 3172TQ, 3172TQ-32T, 3172PQ-XL, and 3172TQ-XL Switches Data Sheet



It sounds like you have already decided about these units. No, seriously, I am not being facetious... Cisco is well known for pulling such shenanigans, so if you are not a fan of their "game" then don't play.

It's fun to play around with discarded data center gear that once cost tens of thousands of dollars.. I just think you will find other gear performs nearly the same for less money. I went the full Brocade/Ruckus route with Chelsio and Intel cards. The Chelsio cards are cheap enough that I can play around with overclocking the ASIC and not break the bank if a card or two burns out. Overclocking, you say? You might know it better as the low-latency (-LL) profile for their T5/T6 cards

Thanks for your perspective. My use case is small business. I'm a big fan of Brocade/Ruckus but need 10Gbase-T and am not very familiar with the market for such switches.

What other gear are you referring to? I've seen Netgear and Mikrotik but am wary of both.

 

[blinkenlights]

My use case is small business.

Oh! That's a whole different ballgame.. as you probably know, the way this usually works is you give your preferred vendor the requirements, their sales engineers conjure up a purchase order for equipment to meet your requirements. So you hope.

If you are trying to do this on your own, read how Cisco positions those 3172 switches: Cisco Nexus 3000 Series Switches (I had no idea they used the same terms to describe the use cases - I was just guessing )

As far as other gear with 48 10Gbase-T ports... I was thinking of Arista's 7050T lineup: https://www.arista.com/assets/data/pdf/Datasheets/7050T_Datasheet.pdf

 

[WeekendWarrior]

As far as other gear with 48 10Gbase-T ports... I was thinking of Arista's 7050T lineup: https://www.arista.com/assets/data/pdf/Datasheets/7050T_Datasheet.pdf

Thanks for your perspective on Cisco and for the new Arista example. I have liked the 40G Arista switches I have and don't know why I didn't look to them for 10g