C3000 Enc + 2 x GbE2c Switches + 4 x BL460c, How many CAT5 cables?

[Mark Matthews]

Hi all,

I've just installed a C3000 Bladesystem (my first) for a customer with 4 x BL460c blades.
My customer is asking how many network cables he should plug in...

There are 2 x GbE2c switches in Interconnect Bays 1 + 2.
Each Blade has its 2 onboard NICs which map to Int Bay 1.
Each blade also has an NC326m NIC in Mezz slot 1 which maps to Int Bay 2.

So, he will have a max of 8 gig going into each switch and only a max of 5 gig coming out (of ports 20 to 24)

As far as I can see it, he's going to get a bottleneck even if he plugs all 10 cables into his network...?

I've looked for a 'best practices' type doc but cannot find anything.

What would be the best way to hook up the 5 uplink ports on each switch?

Any help / guidance gratefully received.

Thanks
Mark...

[SteveMacNZ]

Hi Mark,

First you would need to check that your customer requires all 5 of those uplinks, If the rest of their infrastructure only has 1GB uplinks between the switches then having 1 or 2 ports per switch should be fine. If you require more than 1 port connected to the uplink switch check that the uplink switch supports trunking, then trunk the required ports together at the uplink and also on the web management interface on the GbE2c switches.

Hope this helps

Steve:)