Monday, November 14, 2011

How To Configure A Stack On A Brocade (Foundry) FCX648SHPOE

I am often asked to setup a stack with the FCX648SHPOE Brocade switches. This is a pretty simple process to do. Connect the stacking cables in the back appropriately (up on first switch to down on the second switch, and vice versa for controller redundancy). Boot them up and then go through the following configuration:
config t
stack enable
exit
stack secure
config t
stack mac XXXX.XXXX.XXXX <--- Primary switch MAC address

After the "stack secure" command, the stack will start to configure. It will take a few seconds and then all switches except the primary switch will reboot. To see the stack configuration, do the "show stack" command. Below you will see that I ran the command when the second switch was still booting up.
FCX648SHPOE Switch#sh stack
alone: standalone, D: dynamic config, S: static config
ID Type Role Mac Address Pri State Comment
1 S FCX648SPOE alone XXXX.XXXX.6bc0 128 local None:0

. +---+
-2/2| 1 |2/1-
. +---+

Current stack management MAC is XXXX.XXXX.6bc0
FCX648SHPOE Switch#Election, was alone --> active, assigned-ID=1, total 2 units, my priority=128
Detect stack member 2 POE capable
Done hot swap: Set stack unit 2 to Ready <--- (NOTICE THE 2nd UNIT HAS BOOTED UP AND IS READY IN THE STACK)
sh stack <--- I RAN THE "SHOW STACK" COMMAND AGAIN TO SEE THE 'CURRENT' TOPOLOGY.
alone: standalone, D: dynamic config, S: static config
ID Type Role Mac Address Pri State Comment
1 S FCX648SPOE active XXXX.XXXX.6bc0 128 local Ready
2 D FCX624SPOE member XXXX.XXXX.a000 0 remote Ready

. active
. |+---+ +---+|
-2/1| 1 |2/2--2/1| 2 |2/2-
. | +---+ +---+ |

Current stack management MAC is XXXX.XXXX.6bc0
FCX648SHPOE Switch#Election, was active, no role change, assigned-ID=1, total 2 units, my priority=128

That is all you have to do. Brocade certainly makes this an easy process.

4 comments:

  1. What if you do the sh stack command and the mac address of the member is all zero's?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Kevin. I have not seen that happen when Ive done a stack before. Im just not sure. Ill do some research on it as I have time. If you come up with the answer before I do, Id be interested in hearing what you found out.

      Delete
  2. So what I found out is that the stacking module was going bad and it was not detecting the other switches. Fix was to just found either fiber or crossover cable and link them together.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Kevin for the update. You might can RMA the unit.

      Delete

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