Brocade 3200 long range ISL

[Rudy Williams]

Hello--

I have four HP/Brocade 3200 (8 port) switches running Fabric OS v3.0.1b. Two are in the main data center and two more are across the campus in another data center.

A 9 micron fiber run (just shy of 2000 feet) connects the two buildings. I want to put in place an ISL between switches.

Is there any special switch configuration required on the switch? (e.g. long distance port configuration)

Thanks.


cjw

[Oliver Haensel · Accepted solution]

Hi,

you can just connect these 2 switches with the 9micron cable if you choose long wave SFPs (A6516A). Depending on your requirements it might be good to set the port speed of your ISL ports fix to either 1 or 2 GBit/s.

If you have more than 1 fibre between your data centers think about multiple ISLs. Brocade offers the ISL trunking feature which is also available through HP to aggregate multiple fibres for use as a single pipe. In order to use this feature you must purchase the full fabric license (which comes with the fc-8b) and the ISL trunking license.

Hope that helps.

-Oliver-

[Patrick Rieg]

Hello,

For interconnecting 2 or more Brocade switches with an ISL you just need to connect the switches with the fiber.
There is an optional feature "extended fabric" but with the distance of 2000 feet you don't need the feature, you just need the long-wave fibre connection (9 micron fiber)
Just connect and it will work

Patrick