Brocade Communications Systems Bigiron RX Series - Manual (Page 2)

all size packets. Scalable to over two billion
packets per second, the BigIron RX Series
is the most powerful Ethernet switch family
in the industry. This advanced and scalable
design ensures the reliable deliver of all IP-
based voice, video and data applications.
the BigIron RX switches ship with field-
proven IronWare networking software
and IronShield security, embedded sFlow
per port, advanced Ethernet switching,
IPv4/IPv6 routing and multilayer security
services. The BigIron RX Series enables
a user to deploy a reliable, secure and
scalable networking solution today that
is ready to accommodate tomorrow’s
applications and technologies.
PurPose-built Feature set
For DemanDing networks
industry-leading Performance
and scalability
The BigIron RX Series is the industry’s most
powerful switch family, delivering up to 3.2
terabits per second data throughput per
system.
High-availability Design
Redundant and resilient design ensures
high availability operation for demanding
environments:
• Redundant, hot-swappable components
provide non-stop service delivery:
– management module: Systems
configured with dual management
modules with sub-second detection
and fail-over
– switch Fabric element redundancy:
Systems configured with a redundant
switch fabric module support
millisecond fail-over performance
– Hitless management Failover (HmF):
Stateful failover ensures that the
forwarding engines on the line modules
are not impacted by a management
failover. This capability enables non-
stop packet forwarding in the event
of a management module failover.
– redundant Power supplies: All three
chassis support M+N power module
redundancy for AC and DC power
configurations
• Distributed Forwarding architecture:
Advanced network processors, high-
performance CPU and high-speed memory
on each interface module provide for a
scalable high-performance architecture
• ieee 802.3ad link aggregation up to
eight links: Scalable, cross-module
trunking provides for resilient high-
capacity connections between switches
• Resilient Layer 2 and Layer 3 protocols
provide fast service restoration in event
of link or equipment failures:
– Metro Ring Protocol optimized for ring
topologies, IEEE 802.1s and 802.1w
for general Layer 2 topologies, VSRP
for redundant switch configurations
and VRRP/VRRP-E for redundant router
configurations, EcMP for routed
backbones
robust layer 3 Feature set
Brocade IronWare ™ software suite includes
scalable EGP and IGP routing protocols:
• bgPv4: Scalable to 4 million routes,
500 peers and 14,000 attributes with
MR2 management module
• osPF: Scalable to over 400,000 routes
• is-is: Support for Level 1 and Level 2,
includes 25,000 routes and 512
adjacencies
• brocade Direct routing (bDr): The
forwarding information base (FIB) is
downloaded to the hardware-based
forwarding engine on each line module.
This memory can be pre-populated with
as many as 512,000 IPv4 and 64,000
IPv6 routes for wire-speed routing
performance.
• Policy-based routing (Pbr): Support
customizable routing policies using
access control lists (ACLs). This feature
can be used to balance network usage
by controlling the network paths for
different traffic flows.
• Comprehensive multicast Feature set:
Provides hardware-based support for a
number of multicast protocols including
MSDP, PIM-SM (Sparse Mode) and PIM-DM
(Dense Mode), allowing network managers
to efficiently deploy next-generation
multicast applications
• VrrP and VrrPe (enhanced VrrP):
Enables the BigIron RX to operate as
a backup router to other network routers.
In the event of a router failure, the BigIron
RX will automatically and seamlessly
perform the tasks of the failed router.
industry-leading layer 2 Features
to provide self-healing topologies in Layer 2
configurations, the BigIron RX supports
industry standard Ethernet protocols
including Spanning Tree Protocol (STP),
Rapid Spanning tree (RStP), per VLaN
StP (PVSt) and per VLaN group StP (PVGSt).
The BigIron RX also supports Brocade Metro
Ring Protocol (MRP) for sub-second service
restoration in ring topologies. Additionally,
the BigIron RX supports multi-instance
spanning tree, VLaN topology grouping
and VLaN tunneling for advanced Layer 2
service configurations.
Feature bigiron rX-4 bigiron rX-8 bigiron rX-16 bigiron rX-32
I/o Module Slots 4 8 16 32
Switching capacity per system
Available data capacity
Total switch capacity 400 Gbps
960 Gbps 800 Gbps
1.92 tbps 1.60 tbps
3.84 tbps 3.2 tbps
5.12 tbps
Packet forwarding capacity per system 286 Mpps 571 Mpps 1,142 Mpps 2.284 Mpps
Max 10-GbE ports per system 16 32 64 128
Max 1-GbE ports per system 192 384 768 1,536
Height (inches/rack units) 7"/4RU 12.25"/7RU 24.5"/14RU 57.75"/33RU
airflow Side-to-Side Side-to-Side Front-to-Back Front-to-Back
Power supply redundancy M+N M+N M+N M+N
system summary
(M = Number of supplies needed for fully loaded system and N = 1 to M supply redundancy)