HP 2650 configuration...question

[n00blar]

I have configured my switch ( 2650 ) with STP and I've enabled Fast Mode on all ports except for the uplink ports.
I setup the uplink ports ( ports 49, 50 ) as Trunk1 ( type Trunk ); my question is:
Do I have to set these two ports (49 and 50) as Fast-Uplink ports under the STP config section?
Basically I want to get 2GB uplink to my core switch.
Thanks for your comments.

[Ron Kinner]

Fast-Uplink is for redundant connections and will not let you do 2G. You need to look at Port Trunking. See Page 10-12 in the

ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/networking/software/59906023e01-Mgmt-ch10-Port_Controls.pdf

(You may have to copy the link and paste it onto your browser.)

Ron

[Stuart Teo]

Hi there,

May I ask why you are running STP and not RSTP? RSTP is "better" by design. Flaws in STP were studied and remedied in RSTP.

In RSTP, while the verbage has changed, all the ports are in Fast Mode by default. The new verbage is Edge Port = Yes.

If you were using RSTP and you wanted to get a 2 x 1 gb trunk, you wouldn't have to tweak any settings at all. Failover times, say if you had 2 trunks going over to the same switch, would be so much faster.

[n00blar]

Thank you all for your reply.
I just finished reading the docs on the CD and found part of the answer.
As far as running STP as opposed to RSTP, at this time my core switch is setup with STP and I just wanted to keep things simple until I make sure that there aren't any issues with my core switch, CISCO switch, and my edge switches, HP switches. I'm deploying HP switches as edge switches and replacing my current edge switches, DELL switches, after a long a painful experience with DELL switches.
Thanks for your comments :)

[Stuart Teo]

Then it might be a better for you to run RSTP. RSTP has a fallback mechanism that will fallback to STP on a per-port-basis. That way, when you move up to RSTP, you don't have to come back to the already-RSTP-capable switches to reconfigure them. That's just IMHO, my 2 cents. :)

[Stuart Teo]

Question: would you like to share with us your experience with the Dell switches?

[n00blar]

Quote..
Question: would you like to share with us your experience with the Dell switches?

DELL switches are NOT ready for enterprise use yet. Their high end switches (PowerConnect 5224) have, in my opinion, severe issues that they're still not able to fix after 3 firmware updates. We replaced these, PowerConnect 5224, with CISCO switches and our network hasn't gone down since we went in production with them. We're about to replace our edge switches (PowerConnect 3248) with HP switches.
I will install my first HP edge switch next week and I'll see how things go.