Quanta LB6M (10GbE) -- Discussion

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_Adrian_

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Jun 25, 2012
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Price is a factor. I use DAC for anything that is staying in the rack if it is leaving the rack then I use SFP+ transceivers.
Just asking as OM3 is fairly cheap on EvilBay and same for the XFP modules.
Main question... What XFP Modules are compatible ?
 
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_Adrian_

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Jun 25, 2012
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Today I picked up another Firebox ( X550e ) for "server" duties. This unit will receive one of the HP NC510F's alongside a way Faster Processor and the max out the RAM as it will be the the VPN box.
On top of this, It's gonna be a few more days before my 2 Virtual Connect 1/10F's will arrive anyway.
My plan is to use all 4 pairs ( 2 XFP's on each networking blade ) from the VC1/10F's to the LB6M running in LACP.
I'm "reducing" my cabling through MPO cassettes. This way I can run multiple fibers at once with a single drop and leave room for future "expansion" which is expensive initially, but cheaper in the long run as with a double cassette it gives me 24 fibers or 12 pairs in a single drop as well as a certain degree of redundancy and future proofing.
NOTE: I will also be using my 1GB optics through the same cassettes into my HP ProCurve 2824 that's currently my "HOME" network.

This 10G network will be a dedicated SERVER network, meanwhile the 1G will be an grey area of mixed devices and AP's.
The only device outside the servers on the 10G will be my HTPC which runs Kodi on it.
 

frogtech

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Jan 4, 2016
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I actually can't seem to get jumbo packets working, I've set reduced the issue to the bare minimum with no teamed nics or hyper-v virtual adapters, set the jumbo packet to 9000 in the adapter properties and set the global mtu to 9216 on the switch. When I test with ping -f -l 9000 I get "packet must be fragmented". Any ideas?
 

redwing31

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Feb 12, 2016
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Alright folks, can anyone provide insight on 1G SFP (optical, SM or MM don't care) that will work? I have tried what I have laying around, and no joy. Seems like the port is forced to 10G, but if I do [Config->Interface 0/2-> Speed ?] it shows 10 or 100M, and if i try either of those, or 1000 it errors with invalid physical mode for this port or invalid input.

Show Port All indicates that port 0/1-0/24 are 10G FD. My 10G stuff is working fine.

FW version 1.2.0.14, I have not tried other firmware yet.
 

djflow195

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Jan 1, 2016
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When I test with ping -f -l 9000 I get "packet must be fragmented". Any ideas?
Try with -l 8900 and work your way up in size by 10. When it stops, go down in size by 1 until it succeeds. Add 28 to that number and that is your IP MTU.

Ping should add 28 bytes (IP Header and ICMP Header) to whatever number is in -l for the overall packet size.
 
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redwing31

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Im sure those work well, but I have 10GbE transceivers that work just fine. I (and I believe several others) are looking for info on 1GbE transceivers.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

dwright1542

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Dec 26, 2015
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yeah seems to be more not working than working, hopefully @dwright1542 or someone else will be able to provide some info.

FWIW, I have tried:

Molex DAC P/N 73929-0024
Cisco DS-SFP-FC4G-SW
Agilestar GLC-LH-SM
[Unbranded] 1000BASELX-SFP
It's in production, and it may be awhile until I can pull one. I'm pretty sure it's a Finistar. I am running jumbo frames on it, BTW. No special config needed on the port.
 

Terry Kennedy

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Jun 25, 2015
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Alright folks, can anyone provide insight on 1G SFP (optical, SM or MM don't care) that will work? I have tried what I have laying around, and no joy. Seems like the port is forced to 10G, but if I do [Config->Interface 0/2-> Speed ?] it shows 10 or 100M, and if i try either of those, or 1000 it errors with invalid physical mode for this port or invalid input.
Gigabit Ethernet on a SFP+ port requires hardware support in the switch and a SFP that the switch recognizes as compatible. This is a lot harder than it seems, for a number of reasons.

Think of a fiber SFP or SFP+ as a light-to-electricity converter. There is no need for "smarts" inside - just a little EEPROM that tells the switch what the characteristics of the SFP/SFP+ are. Various monitoring functions (transmit / receive optical signal level, temperature, etc.) are optional.

1000Base-T SFPs are a special case - multi-speed ones actually do the speed conversion inside the SFP and look like a vanilla Gigabit port to the switch.

The same problem can show up when you try to do 100Mbit on SFP. Most 100Mbit SFPs are dumb, don't do speed conversion, and need multispeed support in the switch. There are some that do speed conversion, but they're pretty rare. I've never seen an optical GigE/10GbE speed-converting SFP. There's currently no equivalent to the 1000Base-T SFP for 10GbE because any current design would exceed the allowable power available at the SFP+ jack.

If a switch has combo SFP+ / RJ45 ports, those are normally the ones most likely to work with a GigE SFP, since the switch already has to be able to handle multiple speeds on the copper side of things.

SFP / SFP+ are optimized for low price ("low" being a relative term if you're buying genuine Cisco parts). The XENPAK optic, which was used on early designs (normally on a GigE switch that offered one or two "10 Gigabit ready" ports) was much more complicated - the interface on the switch side is pretty close to a dumb parallel port - all of the timing, serialization, and encoding is done in the XENPAK itself. That made the switch design cheap, but the XENPAKs were incredibly expensive, ran hot, and were generally a pain to deal with. They attached to the switch with a pair of thumbscrews, and the electrical connection was a bit "twitchy" - Cisco issued an advisory that "the switch may begin to smoke" when a XENPAK is inserted and suggested powering off the switch first. X2 was a slightly newer design with the same electrical interface but a smaller physical size. It had an odd design where the way to properly remove the X2 from the switch was to unplug the fiber cable and then tug on the connector, which was spring-loaded and would cause the X2 to release from the switch. Fortunately things became a lot more sensible when SFP+ became the normal module type. Since the "smarts" are moved into the switch, this means that the switch has to be willing to support other speeds besides 10GbE for any chance of an SFP to work.
 

Fritz

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Apr 6, 2015
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Holly Molly, just tried a Finisar 1gb and it works. :)

I use fiber to electrically isolate my network from the incoming cable internet. Learned the hard way that is is a good idea in my neck of the woods. A couple of years ago I got hit by lightning twice in a month and it took out mostly the networking infrastructure, switchs and nics.

Anyways, it a Finisar FTRJ-8519-7D HP part #J4858A
 
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redwing31

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Holly Molly, just tried a Finisar 1gb and it works. :)

I use fiber to electrically isolate my network from the incoming cable internet. Learned the hard way that is is a good idea in my neck of the woods. A couple of years ago I got hit by lightning twice in a month and it took out mostly the networking infrastructure, switchs and nics.

Anyways, it a Finisar FTRJ-8519-7D HP part #J4858A

Any chance you know what the difference between a FTRJ-8519-7D and FTRJ-8519-7D-2.5 is?
 

redwing31

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I think the FTRJ-8519-7D-2.5 is a 2gb transceiver? I just did a quick splash check in google.
Yeah, just being a cheapo i guess, FTRJ-8519-7D-2.5 is considerably cheaper on fleabay than FTRJ-8519-7D... hoping maybe the "2.5" part is irrelevant.
 

redwing31

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no, that's cool. the FTRJ-8519-7D-2.5 should be ok, as long as it works right? I posted a link on my above post for $3 FTRJ-8519-7D's. Not sure of shipping though.
FTRJ-8519-7D
Looks like the FTRJ-8519-7D-2.5 are Fibre Channel, so not gonna bother trying them. Thanks for the info, and hopefully mine works with the FTRJ-8519-7D!
 

dwright1542

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Dec 26, 2015
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Holly Molly, just tried a Finisar 1gb and it works. :)

I use fiber to electrically isolate my network from the incoming cable internet. Learned the hard way that is is a good idea in my neck of the woods. A couple of years ago I got hit by lightning twice in a month and it took out mostly the networking infrastructure, switchs and nics.

Anyways, it a Finisar FTRJ-8519-7D HP part #J4858A
Thought that's what I had in there. Glad it worked.
 

redwing31

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Thought that's what I had in there. Glad it worked.
Ok, so I got mine in the mail yesterday, but still no link. Can you provide a "show port", firmware version, etc.? on mine, this is what I see:

Code:
!System Description "Quanta LB6M, 1.2.0.14, Linux 2.6.21.7"
!System Software Version "1.2.0.14"
!Additional Packages     FASTPATH QOS

(SW00-CoreSwitch) #show port 0/10

                  Admin    Physical   Physical   Link   Link    LACP   Actor
Intf      Type   Mode     Mode       Status     Status Trap    Mode   Timeout
--------- ------ --------- ---------- ---------- ------ ------- ------ --------
0/10             Enable    10G Full              Down   Enable  Enable long

(SW00-CoreSwitch) (Interface 0/10)#speed ?

10                       Set speed to '10 Mbps'.
100                      Set speed to '100 Mbps'.

(SW00-CoreSwitch) (Interface 0/10)#speed 100 full-duplex

0/10
Invalid physical mode for this port.

(SW00-CoreSwitch) (Interface 0/10)#speed 1000 full-duplex
                                            ^
% Invalid input detected at '^' marker.
*Update 1: Firmware is now 1.2.0.18, no change to above.
 
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redwing31

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So your finisar transceivers don't work? Sorry to hear. I am trying to grab mines from my brother. he is looking for it now. Knew i should have took them from his ass before. Now he lost them. Oh well, gotta buy more i guess. Hey Redwing, maybe its a jumbo frames/interface/config setting or something? Just thought i would throw a suggestion out there.
Yeah, exact model that @Fritz said worked for him did not work for me. I thought about jumbo frames as well, but even with MTU (on that port) set to 1518, no link. I don't know what else to look for or what the options are...
 

aj84

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Oct 28, 2015
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Holly Molly, just tried a Finisar 1gb and it works. :)
[...], it a Finisar FTRJ-8519-7D HP part #J4858A
Could you please post "show port all" output of the quanta with your Finisar running at 1GBit/s?

Just grabbed two cheap "Finisar FTRJ-8519-7D-2.5" (non-HP branded)...my LB6M and LB4M don't like them. It is identical to what redwing31 posted above (ports are still shown as "Physical Mode = 10G Full" + "Link Status = Down"). But they seem to work flawless in an older Linksys Switch running at 1GBit/s, so they actually can do ethernet (and not only FibreChannel).

Now I'm thinking about trying these: HP J4858A 1000BASE-SX SFP Transceiver | FS.COM