Benefits of VSS

 

 

 

VSS Benefits

• Single Configuration
• Single Node to manage
• Only 1 gateway IP address needed
• No need for HSRP/VRRP/GLBP
• MEC (Multi-chassis Etherchannel) simplified loop-free topologies
• Physical switches can be located provided they do not exceed to 10Gb Ethernet distance requirements
• Nonstop communications, Inter-chassis stateful fail-over, Eliminate L2/L3 protocol re-convergence if a VSS member switch fails
• Deterministic sub-second VSS recovery
• 802.3ad and PagP for deterministic sub-second L2 recovery
• Scales to 1.4Tbps

 

 

VSS offers superior benefits compared to traditional Layer 2/Layer 3 network design. Benefits can be grouped into four main categories:

 

1. VSS increases operational efficiency by simplifying the network, reducing switch management overhead by at least 50 percent.

• Single point of management, IP address, and routing instance for the Cisco Catalyst 6500 virtual switch

– Single configuration file and node to manage. Removes the need to configure redundant switches twice with identical policies.

– Only one gateway IP address is required per VLAN, instead of the three IP addresses per VLAN used today.

– Removes the need for Hot Standby Router Protocol (HSRP), Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP), and Gateway Load Balancing Protocol (GLBP)

– CiscoWorks LAN Management System (LMS) 3.0 can be used to centrally manage a Cisco Catalyst 6500 virtual switch as a single entity.

• Multichassis EtherChannel® (MEC) is a Layer 2 multipathing technology that creates simplified loop-free topologies, eliminating the dependency on Spanning Tree Protocol, which can still be activated to protect strictly against any user misconfiguration.

• Flexible deployment options. The underlying physical switches do not have to be colocated. The two physical switches are connected with standard 10 Gigabit Ethernet interfaces and as such can be located any distance based on the distance limitation of the chosen 10 Gigabit Ethernet optics. For example, with X2-10GB-ER 10 Gigabit Ethernet optics, the switches can be located up to 40 km apart.

2. VSS boosts nonstop communications.

• Interchassis stateful failover results in no disruption to applications that rely on network state information (for example, forwarding table info, NetFlow, Network Address Translation [NAT], authentication, and authorization). VSS eliminates L2/L3 protocol reconvergence if a virtual switch member fails, resulting in deterministic subsecond virtual switch recovery.

• Utilizes EtherChannel (802.3ad or Port Aggregation Protocol (PAgP) for deterministic subsecond Layer 2 link recovery, removing the dependency on Spanning Tree Protocol for link recovery.

3. VSS scales system bandwidth capacity to 1.4 Tbps.

• Activates all available Layer 2 bandwidth across redundant Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Switches with automatic, even load sharing. Link load sharing is optimized because it is based on more granular information, such as L2/L3/L4 parameters, unlike virtual LAN (VLAN)-based load balancing in Spanning Tree Protocol configuration.

• Enables standards-based link aggregation for server network interface card (NIC) teaming across redundant data center switches, maximizing server bandwidth throughput and increasing the number of standards-based components in the data center (that is, server NICs) with needing to configure proprietary NIC vendor mechanisms.

• Maximizes the utilization of all (132) 10 Gigabit Ethernet ports in a Cisco Catalyst 6500 virtual switch.

• Conserves bandwidth by:

– Eliminating unicast flooding caused by asymmetrical routing in traditional campus designs.

– Optimizing the number of hops for intracampus traffic using multichassis EtherChannel enhancements.

4. VSS utilizes existing multilayer switching architecture.

• VSS enhances existing multilayer switching architecture using simplification of architecture without fundamentally changing the architecture resulting in easy of adoption of the technology.

• Uses existing Cisco Catalyst 6500 investments, easing the deployment of VSS. The VSS is supported on non-E and E series Catalyst 6500 Series Switches chassis and supports all Cisco Catalyst 6500 series 6700 series modules.

• VSS uses standards-based 10 Gigabit Ethernet connectivity between the Cisco Catalyst 6500 virtual switch members, allowing for flexible distance options. The underlying physical switches do not have to be collocated.