How do I enable the link?

[mikhen]

Hi

I have one 2910Al-24 in one end and a 5412zl-92 in the other end, they are connected with a 10 Gb fiber, nothing in between. We have today measured the fiber, nothing wrong. We can see that both switches are sending, but I can't enable the link. And the LED indicator are dark. So I switched the 5412zl-92 with a 2910Al-48, and tried to enable the link, it worked fine. The link came up and I'm able to communicate, then I switched back  to 5412zl switch and back to darkness. I have verified that the hardware is ok. Any ideas?

[Fredrik Lönnman]

what kind of modules and SFPs are you using?

[mikhen]

2910Al are equipt with one J9008A (2-port 10-GbE SFP+al modules), and two J9150A (10 GbE SFP+SR). 5412zl are only equipt with one J9150A (10 GbE SFP+SR). The fiber is a single mode fiber.

[Fredrik Lönnman]

Any message in the switch logs?

[mikhen]

Nope, none at all. So what I do to get it started is to mix TX-TX or RX-RX in every combination there is, restart the switches a couple of time, and after have done this a couple of times or days (no it is not a joke) the link starts, it can't be a normal procedure to do this to start a 10 Gb link.

I have made a trouble report on this due to excessive error rate on this link, and HP in Amstelveen had no answer on my question, so is there anyone on this forum that have seen this behavior before? And can it be that the switches are too sensitive to errors? When measuring the dampening on the fiber, it returned 0 (zero) dbm. 

[Patrick R]

Which firmwares on both switches, are you running the minimum required FM to support the transceiver on the 5400? it could also be that is a software issue!!!do you notice in port flapping when it works.

you mentioned that you are you using a single mode while this one provide 10-Gigabit connectivity up to 300 m on multimode fiber cable. 

[mikhen]

2910Al fw

Image stamp:    /sw/code/build/sbm(t4a)
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Boot Image:     Primary

5412zl fw

Image stamp:    /sw/code/build/btm(K_15_02)
                Oct 20 2010 16:19:41
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Boot Image:     Primary

Multimode fiber has a relatively large light carrying core, usually 62.5 microns or larger in diameter. It is usually used for short distance transmissions with LED based fiber optic equipment. Single-mode fiber has a small light carrying core of 8 to 10 microns in diameter. It is normally used for long distance transmissions with laser diode based fiber optic transmission equipment.. Since we have long distance and tricky installations enviroment, I prefer single mode fiber.

When it works, (if I get it to work :) ) I have no flapping at all. I have also set the fault-finding option to "low" on every fault, so this one don't mess with the connection.

[mikhen]

Hi

I cracked the case, strange that HP Custom Care didn't find it. And why HP reseller didn't know either is a mystery. Reading the specs for the transceiver gives me this:

HP X132 10G SFP+ LC SR Transceiver J9150A Multi-mode fiber

HP X132 10G SFP+ LC LR Transceiver J9151A Singel-mode fiber

HP X132 10G SFP+ LC LRM Transceiver J9152A Multi-mode fiber

HP X132 10G SFP+ LC ER Transceiver J9153A Singel-mode fiber

So we have wrong SFP's. And the sad part is that the SFP's we need (J9151A) is an additional 5000€ to the previous price.

Regards Mike