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This chapter describes the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family and hosted virtual service blades. This chapter includes the following sections:
The Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family includes the Cisco Nexus 1010, Cisco Nexus 1010-X, Cisco Nexus 1110-S, and Cisco Nexus 1110-X. The Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform provides dedicated hardware for Cisco Nexus 1000V Virtual Supervisor Modules (VSMs) and can now host VSMs that were hosted on virtual machines, which allows you to install and manage a Cisco Nexus 1000V VSM like a standard Cisco switch. The Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform supports the Cisco Nexus 1000V for VMware vSphere and Microsoft Hyper-V.
The services managed by the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family are called virtual service blades (VSBs). The Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family supports the following VSBs:
For more information about VSBs, see the Virtual Service Blades section.
The following table lists the number of VSBs supported by the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family.
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For more information about the number of VSBs supported and hosted on the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Compatibility Information Guide.
Figure 1-1 shows how the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform hosts a Cisco Nexus 1000V VSM and its Virtual Ethernet Modules (VEMs) VEMs in your network.
Figure 1-1 Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Architecture
The Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform supports high availability. Two Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platforms can form a HA pair to provide high availability. If control connectivity is lost for a Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform, but management connectivity is preserved, the active Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform reloads the standby once. The standby comes up in a wait state until control connectivity is restored. In a HA pair, the active and standby Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platforms use control connectivity to synchronize data.
The Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform supports the following two forms of high availability concurrently:
Figure 1-2 shows the HA components and the communication links between them.
Figure 1-2 Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform HA Components and Communication Links
Table 1-1 compares running a VSM on a Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform with running a VSM on a virtual machine.
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3841 |
6402 |
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Note The Cisco Nexus 1000V currently supports the hypervisor host machine that runs on VMware vSphere or Microsoft Hyper-V hypervisors.
Figure 1-3 compares running a VSM on a Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform with running a VSM on a virtual machine.
Figure 1-3 VM and Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Comparison
The Cisco Integrated Management Controller (CIMC) is a software interface included with the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform. CIMC allows you to configure serial over LAN (SoL) access and set up remote management if the device becomes unreachable. For more information about remote management, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Software Installation and Upgrade Guide .
When installing the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform, you have the option to configure the CIMC interface. To configure the CIMC software while installing the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Hardware Installation Guide .
The services (VSM, NAM, VSG, VXLAN Gateway) hosted, created, and managed by the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family are called virtual service blades (VSBs).
Note A Cisco Nexus 1000V Virtual Supervisor Module (VSM) in this guide refers to the service hosted on VMware vSphere and Microsoft Hyper-V.
VSBs are created using ISO or OVA image files found in the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform bootflash repository. The ISO defines the following for a VSB:
For more information about VSBs, see the Configuring Virtual Blades section.
For information about the supported VSBs, software compatibility, and the weighing matrix to determine the maximum capacity on the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Compatibility Information Guide .
This section describes the uplinks that you connected during your installation of the hardware. For more information about these connections and the prerequisites for the switches that are upstream from your Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Hardware Installation Guide .
This section includes the following topics:
Table 1-2 lists and describes the classes of network traffic carried on the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform uplinks:
Table 1-3 describes the available uplink configurations.
You choose the type of uplink for your network. See the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Software Installation and Upgrade Guide , for more information.
Note After you configure an uplink type, the only way to modify it is to reload the software.
A flexible network uplink offers complete flexibility to connect the Cisco Nexus 1110-S or Cisco Nexus 1110-X to the network, and allows flexible deployment of the VSBs on the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform product family. A flexible configuration enables appropriate traffic segregation policies such as VSB traffic segregation. In the default flexible network uplink configuration, each physical port acts as an individual uplink. See Figure 1-4. You can then make changes to the default configuration by adding ports to a port channel or by assigning uplinks to a VSB interface. See figure 1-5.
Figure 1-4 Topology 5: Flexible network Uplink Without vPC or VSS (Default)
Figure 1-5 Topology 5: Flexible network Uplink With vPC or VSS (Default)
In this topology, your Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform pair connects to your network in two uplinks as shown in the following figures:
For detailed information about connecting uplinks, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Hardware Installation Guide .
Figure 1-6 Topology 1: Single Uplink Without vPC or VSS
Figure 1-7 Topology 1: Single Uplink With vPC or VSS
In topology 2, six Gigabit Ethernet ports on each Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform create two uplinks. The ports in each Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform internally form a port channel and network traffic is load balanced based on the source MAC algorithm.
You must configure LACP on the upstream switches that connect to ports 3, 4, 5, and 6.
In topology 2, your Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform pair connects to your network in two uplinks as shown in the following figures:
For detailed information about connecting uplinks, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Hardware Installation Guide .
Figure 1-8 Topology 2: Two Uplinks Without vPC or VSS—
1) Management and Control Uplink and 2) Data Uplink
Figure 1-9 Topology 2: Two Uplinks With vPC or VSS—
1) Management and Control Uplink and 2) Data Uplink
In topology 3, the ports in each Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform internally form a port channel and network traffic is load balanced based on the source MAC algorithm.
LACP must be configured on the upstream switches connecting to ports 3, 4, 5, and 6.
In topology 3, your Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform pair connects to your network in two uplinks as shown in the following figures:
For detailed information about connecting uplinks, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Hardware Installation Guide .
Figure 1-10 Topology 3: Two Uplinks Without vPC or VSS—
1) Management Uplink, and 2) Control and Data Uplink
Figure 1-11 Topology 3: Two Uplinks With vPC or VSS—
1) Management Uplink, and 2) Control and Data Uplink
In topology 4, six Gigabit Ethernet ports on each Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform create three uplinks as shown in one of the following figures:
For detailed information about connecting uplinks, see the Cisco Nexus Cloud Services Platform Hardware Installation Guide .
Figure 1-12 Topology 4: Three Uplinks Without vPC or VSS
1) Management, 2) Control, and 3) Data
Figure 1-13 Topology 4: Three Uplinks With vPC or VSS
1) Management, 2) Control, and 3) Data