Cisco Network Consulting

Cisco's Catalyst family of modular and fixed managed switches offers speed and control at the access, aggregation, and core areas of converged IP voice, HD video, and data networks for organizations that range in size from small businesses and branch offices to multi-campus enterprises and SPs. Progent's Cisco-certified CCIE consultants can provide remote and onsite support for Catalyst switches to help you to design an efficient network architecture that meets your specific business needs, configure pilot testing systems, deploy Catalyst switches, implement and verify a sound security strategy, automate network management and performance tracking, provide repair and support services, optimize switch performance, and set up Catalyst's high-availability (HA) solutions for near-zero downtime.

Progent can help you to maintain and repair your older Catalyst switches or migrate seamlessly to up-to-date models of Catalyst switches following industry best practices to make sure that you realize the highest business value from your investment in your network.

The need for intelligent, high-speed switching is driven by a combination of fairly new networking patterns whose overall effect is a cyber avalanche of data traffic:

• Cloud and Internet of Things (IoT) networking and a consequent demand for intensive network virtualization
• The pervasiveness of always-connected mobile devices
• Bandwidth-intensive rich media apps
• Social business technologies
• The rise of Big Data in data analytics
• Ever more sophisticated threats like ransomware

Cisco's current portfolio of Catalyst switches are designed for the distribution and core layers levels of campus environments where office workers must be accommodated by providing dependable performance, strict access management, careful segregation, application intelligence, and wired/wireless convergence. Catalyst series switches address the need for speed and control with capabilities that include high-port-count 10G/40G/100G services, switching performance over 25 Tbps per appliance, a comprehensive catalog of tools including EVN to simplify the creation of VLANs, Virtual Switching System (VSS) technology for stateful interchassis failover with instant backup switch recovery and 99.999% availability, IPv4 and IPv6 capability, Application Visibility and Control to maximize system resource usage, and sophisticated Quality of Service tools for business-critical data prioritization.

Catalyst switches enable organizations of any size to build intelligent switching services into their network infrastructure, deploying an environment that can handle real-time needs, expand to support expected capacity demands, protect vital information, and differentiate and manage tasks to enhance network operations.

Catalyst 1000 Series Fixed Ethernet Switches
Cisco's Catalyst 1000 Series Layer 2 network access switches are compact, fixed switches targeted for smaller businesses and branch offices with as many as 250 workers and with little if any internal IT support. Cisco's Catalyst 1000 Series includes fanless models for silent operation outside a wiring closet in an office venue. Mounting kits include desktop, wall or shelf mount, standard rack mount, and DIN rail mount. Created as a simple upgrade for Cisco Catalyst 2960-L or 2960-Plus Series deployments, the Catalyst 1000 family includes models with 8 to 48G Ethernet ports or 24 to 48 Fast Ethernet 10/100M ports.

Catalyst 1000 set up and management are easy via a web UI or command-line interface, cybersecurity is enterprise-grade, and Power over Ethernet capability with an automatically distributed power budget of 740W allows a wide range of Internet of Things (IoT) deployments. Up to eight Catalyst 1000 Gigabit Ethernet Series switches can be managed together with single IP. All Catalyst 1000 appliances are nonblocking line-rate devices, and all are powered by Cisco's venerable IOS operating system software. QoS features include egress queues for each port plus priority packet queuing to deliver optimized performance for all classes of data. Catalyst 1000 switches also feature Shaped Round Robin (SRR) service scheduling and Weighted Tail Drop congestion avoidance.

Catalyst 9000 Series Fixed and Modular Managed Switches
The Catalyst 9000 line of switches includes modular and fixed units and can support all deployment scenarios including access, aggregation, and core switching. The Cisco Catalyst 9000 family offers devices with the appropriate price/performance to connect workers and things in environments ranging from small businesses and branch offices to global enterprises. Catalyst 9000 switches can be configured to implement any mix of onsite deployments, private and public clouds, and hybrid network models. Modern management platforms and cutting-edge security solutions lower cost of ownership by cutting operational overhead and protecting critical network assets. Cisco's 9000X series of managed switches offer converged switching/routing, introducing the first mix of 400G QSFP-DD ports plus full multigigabit Ethernet and PoE ports.

With double the backplane stacking bandwidth for around half the price of the end-of-life Catalyst 2960-X and 2960-XR switches they are designed to replace, Cisco's Catalyst 9200 Series switches are a compelling network improvement for small branch offices and midsize campus deployments. The 9200 portfolio includes models that support 24 or 48 ports with full PoE+; 80-160 Gbps stacking bandwidth; streaming telemetry; and Layer 3 capabilities such as OSPF, EIGRP, IS-IS, and RIP. Cisco Catalyst 9200 Series switches are powered by the Cisco IOS XE operating system.

The Catalyst 9200 delivers 160-Gbps backplane stacking throughput, features field-replaceable redundant power supplies and fans, and supports add-in interface modules with 4x1G, 4x1/10G, 2x25G, or 2x40G uplink. Cisco's Catalyst 9200 Enhanced VN model allows up to 32 Virtual Networks and offers 160-Gbps stacking performance. The Catalyst 9200L delivers 80-Gbps stacking throughput. Both the Catalyst 9200L multigigabit and the Catalyst 9200 multigigabit support wireless performance tuning with 8 or 12 multigigabit Ethernet ports as fast as 10G.

Catalyst 9300 Series switches are fixed, stackable appliances for high-density access switching. Key features available with various models in the Catalyst 9300 family include up to 1Tbps backplane stacking capacity, stackable high-speed fiber, up to 448 multigigabit Ethernet ports and 288 ports of 90W UPOE+ with an 8-unit stack, end-to-end IPsec tunnel with AES-256 Encryption and speeds as high as 100G, high-availability redundant fans and power supplies, plus StackPower cables common across the entire Catalyst 9300 family.

Powered by Cisco IOS XE, switches in the Catalyst 9300 family offer automated provisioning, API-driven configuration, granular visibility for near realtime monitoring, and seamless software updates and patching. Advanced security capabilities include Encrypted Traffic Analytics (ETA) along with AES-256 MACsec and IPSec encryption, and Trust Anchor Technologies with Image signing. Cloud cybersecurity is strengthened because Catalyst 9300 Series switches have the ability to host the Cisco Umbrella agent directly. This makes it possible for businesses to implement their DNS policies at user or group level to prevent BYOD or IoT clients from accessing dangerous websites.

The value-priced Cisco Catalyst 9300L switch delivers up to 320G backplane stacking capacity and supports 12 100M/1G/2.5G/5G/10G ports and 36 10M/100M/1G ports. The 9300L uses fixed instead of modular uplink hardware for 4 1G, 4 10G, or 2 40G uplink ports. The Cisco Catalyst 9300 appliance features 480G of stacking capacity and supports 48 100M/1G/2.5G/5Gbps ports, 24 100M/1G/2.5G/5G/10Gbps ports, or 48 1G SFP ports. Modular uplink performance supported are 1G, 10G, 25G, or 40G. The high-end Cisco Catalyst 9300X switch provides 1T stacking bandwidth and offers 48 10G port density. The 9300X accepts modular uplinks with dual-rate 100G/40G, multirate 25G/10G/1G, or mGig. Cisco 90W UPOE+ supports IoT-intensive environments such as smart buildings. Cisco offers hardware to provide 100G IPsec.

Cisco's Catalyst 9400 Series devices are modular switches based on the Cisco IOS XE operating system and intended for midsize and enterprise campus access networks. Offering twice the performance and over four times the chassis bandwidth as the legacy Catalyst 6500 it is designed to replace, Cisco's Catalyst 9400 family brings switch technology into the modern age of connectivity driven by security, mobility, Internet of Things, and cloud.

Catalyst 9400 switches are available with 4-slot, 7-slot, and 10-slot chassis. Two of the slots on the chassis are reserved for high-availability supervisor cards, leaving 2, 5, or 8 slots open for line cards. Maximum bandwidth scalability for each line-card slot is 480G. Switching performance can reach 1.44 Tbps and forwarding rate on Supervisor Module can reach 9 Tbps with the 10-slot chassis. All Catalyst 9400 appliances offer 90W UPOE+ on every access port, protected segmentation with Software-Defined Access (SD-Access) and N+N/N+1 power redundancy for high resilience. The Catalyst 9400 4-slot switch can support 96 10/100/1000 ports, 5G/10G mGig ports, or 10G SFP+ ports. The Catalyst 9400 7-slot supports 240 ports, and the Catalyst 9400 10-slot supports 384 ports. All Catalyst 9400 switches can provide 2 non-blocking 40G QSFP uplinks and up to 8 non-blocking 10 Gigabit Ethernet SFP+ uplinks.

The Catalyst 9500 product line consists of fixed core and edge services switches intended for the large campus. Catalyst 9500 switches are based on the Cisco IOS XE operating system and the series incorporates the first infrastructure technology to provide switching rates above 25 Tbps.

Catalyst 9500 models deliver as high as 6.4 Terabits per second switching performance with forwarding throughput as high as 2 Bpps. Catalyst 9500 switches can provide as many as 32 nonblocking 100 Gigabit QSFP28 optical ports, 32 nonblocking 40 Gigabit QSFP+ ports, 48 nonblocking 25G SFP28 ports, or 48 nonblocking 10 Gigabit SFP+ ports. You can configure Multichassis EtherChannel (MEC) across StackWise-Virtual members for high resiliency.

Catalyst 9500X switches can provide up to 25.6 Tbps switching performance with 2 Bpps forwarding speed. Catalyst 9500X devices support up to 28 nonblocking 40/100 GB QSFP28 optical ports or 8 nonblocking 40/100/200/400 Gigabit QSFP-DD ports. The 9500X line also includes chip-level support for line-rate 256-bit 802.1AE Media Access Control Security (MACsec) and WAN-MACsec1 data encryption.

Cisco's Catalyst 9600 Series switches are modular core and distribution appliances for the enterprise campus. The 6-slot 9600 Series chassis using a Catalyst 9600X Series Supervisor delivers switching performance as high as 25.6 Tbps and can contain up to 256 nonblocking 10/25/50 G Ethernet ports, 96 nonblocking 40/100G Gigabit ports, or 8 nonblocking 200/400 Gigabit QSFP-Double Density ports. The Catalyst 9600 also provides dual-rate 40G/100G and 10G/25G optics. Two chassis slots are reserved for redundant supervisors. You can mix and match a selection of line cards for core and aggregation deployment scenarios. The Catalyst 9600 chassis is equipped with a passive backplane, making it possible to replace fan tray, power supplies, and line cards without disruption.

End-of-Life Catalyst Products Still Supported by Progent's Consultants
Progent's Cisco CCIE-certified consultants have broad backgrounds delivering online and on-premises support services for early-generation Catalyst switches which have reached End of Life or End of Support. These legacy Catalyst switches usually cost more to operate and maintain than contemporary models, provide lower capacity and fewer features, and in many cases can subject organizations to compliance and even liability issues. Progent's consultants can assist you to manage and troubleshoot these legacy switches and can also help you to plan and execute non-disruptive upgrades to newer models within the Catalyst family or to solutions from the Cisco Nexus line of network switches which take advantage of Catalyst design experience.

Cisco Catalyst Express 500 and 520 Line
Cisco's Catalyst Express 500 line of Layer 2 switches are designed for organizations with up to 250 employees and provide the reliability, protection, scalability, and feature set small companies require at an affordable price. PoE capability makes it simple to install network appliances like wireless access points and closed-circuit TV cameras.

Versions of the Cisco Catalyst Express 500 managed switches support from 8 to 24 10/100/1000BT ports as well as optional backup power with automatic switch-over for extra dependability. Interoperation with Cisco access points helps organizations to set up a local wireless network quickly and easily. The Catalyst Express 500 family offers strong protection against malicious attacks thanks to the Cisco Self-Defending Network strategy and Clean Access solutions. Catalyst 2940 Switch
Cisco Catalyst 2900 Series fixed-configuration, managed 10/100 Ethernet switches provide basic small-group networking for small to medium-sized companies. These wire-rate desktop switches deliver IOS Software functions for simple data, video, and voice services at the edge of the network. The Cisco 2940 Series switches are small, stackable devices featuring 8 Fast Ethernet connections plus one built-in Fast Ethernet or Gigabit Ethernet uplink. The enclosures can be deployed away from the wiring closet in cramped locations like on a user's desk or in a classroom.

Catalyst 2960-S Series Switch
The Catalyst 2960-S Series are fixed-configuration switches intended for small companies and branch offices. Current models offer 24 or 48 1Gb Ethernet ports, four 1-Gigabit or two 10-Gigabit uplink connections, and provide throughput as high as 176 Gbps. Cisco's FlexStack technology permits up to four Catalyst 2960-S chassis to be combined in a FlexStack stack to act like a single switch that provides 40 Gbps of stacking throughput and that cuts operational expense because of single-switch setup. IPv6 First Hop Security (FHS) capability protects against IPv6 address interception and other threats.

Catalyst 3560 Family Switches
Cisco's Catalyst 3560 Series is a selection of fixed-configuration switches that features IEEE 802.3af and PoE functionality in 10/100 Ethernet and 10/100/1000 configurations. The Catalyst 3560 switch is a proven access-layer switch for midsize business LAN access or branch-offices, combining both Gigabit Ethernet and PoE configurations for high productivity while facilitating the deployment of vital applications such a IP telephony, wireless access, video surveillance, and remote video kiosks. Customers can deploy comprehensive smart services such as quality of service (QoS), rate management, access control lists (ACLs), multicast management, and high-performance IP routing with the simplicity of traditional network switching.

The Catalyst 3560 Series offers a robust set of capabilities that permit network scalability and higher resilience through IP routing plus a complete suite of Spanning Tree Protocol (STP) improvements aimed to maximize availability in an access Layer network. Enhancements to the conventional Spanning Tree Protocol, including Per-VLAN Spanning Tree Plus (PVST+), Uplink Fast, and Port Fast, as well as innovations like Flex Links, contribute to network efficiency. Per-VLAN Spanning Tree Plus (PVST+) allows for Layer 2 load balancing on backup connections to exploit the extra bandwidth inherent in a redundant design.

Important routing protocols including Open Shortest Path First (OPSF), EIGRP, BGP, static routing, and PBR increase system capacity; PIM improves resource utilization; and VRFLite protects network traffic.

Catalyst 3750 Family Switches
For midsized organizations and corporate branch offices, Cisco's Catalyst 3750 switch facilitates deployment of unified technologies and adapts to changing business needs by providing configuration versatility, support for converged network traffic, and management-free configuration of smart system functions. In addition, the Cisco Catalyst 3750 switch is engineered for high-density 1000 Ethernet deployments and includes a diverse range of switches that meet the access, aggregation, and backbone-interface demands of small or midsized deployments.

Cisco's Catalyst 3750 Series includes either the IP Base or the IP Services image. The IP Base image capabilities include industry-leading QoS, rate-management, ACLs, and basic static and RIP routing capability. The IP Services image provides a broader selection of high-end functions, such as advanced built-in IP unicast/multicast routing.

StackWise technology is a stacking architecture designed for 1000 Ethernet. Cisco StackWise is designed to react to additions, deletions, and redeployments while providing dependable performance. StackWise combines up to nine individual switches into one functional unit, utilizing custom stack-interconnect cables and stacking utilities. The individual switches can be any combination of Cisco's Catalyst 3750 switches and Cisco's Catalyst 3750-E Series switches. The stack behaves as a single switching device that is managed by a control switch, elected from one of the stack of switches. The control switch automatically creates and updates all the switching and user-selected routing databases. A running stack can accommodate new devices or remove existing members without service interruption.

Cisco Catalyst 2960 Swiches and 3560-CX Switches
Cisco's Catalyst 2960-CX is a fixed-configuration managed switch that is compact, fanless, power efficient, and includes flexible mounting alternatives. The switch incorporates eight 10/100/1000 Ethernet ports and two Gigabit Ethernet uplink ports and optionally provides PoE+ power. Cisco's Catalyst 3560-CX appliance is a fixed-port managed switch housed in a sleek, noiseless and energy-efficient enclosure that can be placed almost anywhere outside a wiring closet. Models are offered with eight or 12 10/100/1000 Ethernet ports or with six 1-GE ports and 2 multigigabit Ethernet ports. Up to four uplinks are offered, and PoE+ power is also available.

Cisco's Catalyst 2960-L line includes value-priced fixed-port switches designed for small offices, retail venues, and other places where space is at a premium. Catalyst 2900-L compact switches include 8 to 48 GE ports and 2 or 4 SFP uplink ports. Power over Ethernet support reduces clutter and fanless operation for 16- and 24-port models eliminates noise. RJ-45 connectors support 10BASE-T, 100BASE-TX, 1000BASE-T and 1000BASE-T SFP-based ports.

Catalyst 2960-X and Catalyst 2960-XR Series switches enhance the 2690-S line by offering switching capacity of up to 216 Gbps and supporting Cisco's FlexStack-Plus Stacking via a hot-swappable module that allows 8 Catalyst switches in a stack with 80 Gbps of stacking throughput. Catalyst 2900 family switches also support NetFlow-Lite for application visibility and control. Cisco's Catalyst 2960-XR switch is capable of L3 dynamic routing, offering the convenience of using a single device for L2 and L3 routing.

Catalyst 3650 and 3850 Switches
Cisco Catalyst 3650 and Catalyst 3850 switches are fixed, stackable network access switches based on Cisco's IOS XE operating system and incorporating full wireless controller functionality that allows you to control wired and wireless networks on a one device managed by one operating system. Cisco has versions with either 24 or 48 built-in 10/100/1000 Ethernet connections with Power over Ethernet plus (PoE+), four 1-Gigabit or four 10-Gigabit uplink connections, and support for up to nine switches per stack. All versions provide expandable Quality of Service, fast switchover for high availability, software support for IPv4/IPv6 routing, multicast routing, and advanced security features.

Since wireless traffic is present at the Catalyst 3000 family switch, network managers can spot and assign priorities to wireless traffic with Cisco's FNF solution along with sophisticated QoS features for an improved user experience and faster problem mediation. Fast Ethernet switching can handle the high-bandwidth called for by the latest 802.11ac Wave 2 wireless specification on currently in-place cabling infrastructure. (To find out about Progent's consulting and support services for Cisco's 802.11ac Aironet Wi-Fi products, and Meraki cloud-managed APs, refer to Configuration and Troubleshooting Support for Cisco Wireless Products.)

The Cisco Catalyst 3650 Series switch delivers stacking bandwidth as high as 160 Gbps and supports as many as 25 Wi-Fi APs and 1000 wireless clients per switch. The Cisco Catalyst 3850 delivers stacking performance of 480 Gbps and supports up to 50 wireless APs and 2000 wireless clients on each switch. Cisco Catalyst 3850 SFP Fiber Switches incorporate 12 or 24 1G fiber connections at line rate on every port, providing long distance connections, enhanced security, and an identical wired and wireless experience.

Cisco Catalyst 4500-E Series and Cisco Catalyst 4500-X Series Switches
Catalyst 4500-E and and Catalyst 4500-X Series switches are designed for access and distribution deployments where space for infrastructure equipment is at a premium. Running Cisco's IOS XE operating system, the Catalyst 4500-E and 4500-X product lines facilitate virtualization by supporting Cisco's EVN and VSS technologies. Virtualization makes it possible to divide a hardware network into multiple virtual networks (VNs) whose data and control planes are logically distinct. This provides the high resource utilization, security and compliance, recoverability, and simplified management required for Cloud computing or other scenarios where a common infrastructure must be used by software and services that need to run in complete isolation from each other. EVN streamlines the task of deploying VNs and can be expanded to 32 VNs per switch. Easy Virtual Network incorporates features of Multi-VRF and provides new technologies such as VNET Tags and an easy technique for duplicating replicating routes connecting VNs. VSS technology makes it possible to set up Catalyst 4500-E and Catalyst 4500-X Series switches to produce zero-downtime VNs with optimized traffic load balancing.

Cisco Catalyst 4500-E Switches
Cisco's Supervisor Engine 8-E for the Catalyst 4500-E switch includes an integrated wireless network controller that works with Cisco's Unified Access technology for wired and wireless convergence. The Supervisor Engine 8-E is the initial Catalyst supervisor to permit wired plus wireless services on one switch powered by Cisco's IOS XE software. Technologies include Cisco's FNF technology for traffic analytics across wired and Wi-Fi networks, TrustSec/SGT2 wired/wireless data security, identical QoS for wired and wireless networks, and the expansion of Nonstop Forwarding with Stateful Switchover (NSF/SSO) to cover Wi-Fi data traffic for enterprise-class availability.

Offered in chassis that have from three to 10 slots, Catalyst 4500-E switches can support as many as 384 10/100/1000 Ethernet access ports, 193 Gigabit Ethernet fiber fiber connections, 96 10-Gigabit Ethernet fiber connections, and eight 10GE uplink ports. The Catalyst 4500-E Supervisor Engine 8-E delivers as much as 928 Gbps of wired access per system and as much as 20 Gbps of wireless termination performance. 50 Wi-Fi APs and 2000 wireless users can be supported on each chassis, and up to 250 access points and 4000 wireless clients can be supported in a multi-switch installation without requiring a separate wireless controller.

Catalyst 4500-X Series Switches
Catalyst 4500-X switches are fixed-configuration 10GE aggregation platforms that can provide as much as 800 Gbps of backplane switching capacity per chassis. The Catalyst 4500-X switch supports up to 32 10GE ports on the baseboard and eight additional 10GE ports on the expansion module for a total of up to 40 10-Gigabit Ethernet ports. Eight 10GE uplink ports can be added with a separate module. In addition to offering non-stop performance and simple manageability, Cisco's virtual switching system solution on Catalyst 4500-X switches offers increased system throughput of as much as 1.6 Tbps by enabling all possible capacity between VSS-linked Catalyst 4500-X switches. Other advanced features include Cisco's Flexible NetFlow technology for capacity planning, TrustSec security, and wire-rate IPv6 forwarding.

Catalyst 6500 Series and Catalyst 6800 Series Switches
Catalyst 6500 Series and Cisco Catalyst 6800 switches are campus core switches that share the proven DNA of the Cisco Catalyst 6500 family of switches, which first appeared over a decade ago and have been steadily improved ever since. Cisco Catalyst 6500 and Catalyst 6800 Series switches offer the same features and operational consistency, and the modular Catalyst 6807-XL accepts the Cisco Catalyst 6500 Series Supervisor Engine 2T and its portfolio of line cards and modules. This mutual compatibility and commitment to continual enhancement preserves your information technology investment and permits you to upgrade your network backbone with minimal downtime or management staff re-education.

Common attributes of Catalyst 6500 and Catalyst 6800 Series modular switches equipped with the Supervisor Engine 2T include the Cisco ISE technology for simple, single-point administration to put in place unvarying policy throughout a distributed network, VSS Quad Sup SSO (VS4O) technology for 99.999% availability through multi-level redundancy, and Cisco's Campus Locator/ID Separation Protocol to facilitate client roaming and mobility and to streamline network virtualization and migration to IPv6. Other virtualization features to partition specific user groups and support the unique security and Quality of Service policy needs of each group include Layer 2 and Layer 3 VPN, complete MPLS, Easy Virtual Network, VPN Routing and Forwarding-aware technology for Network Address Translation NetFlow, IPv6 over IPv4 GRE Tunnels, and Layer 2 geographic extensions with VPLS. For converged wired and wireless environments, the Wireless Services Module 2 (WiSM2) controller Catalyst 6500 and Cisco Catalyst 6800 modular switches can manage as many as 1000 wireless APs and 15,000 wireless users.

Catalyst 6500-E Series Switches
The Cisco Catalyst 6500-E line of modular switches are intended for aggregation and enterprise backbone environments that need world-class availability and high densities of 1 Gigabit Ethernet, 1 Gigabit Ethernet fiber, or 10 and 40 GE ports. Available versions have three to 13 expansion slots and work with a broad selection of interfaces. Integrated service modules support wireless management, traffic monitoring, and data protection. Only E-Series models of Cisco's extensive line of 6500 switches are compatible with Cisco's Supervisor Engine 2T.

The value-priced Cisco Catalyst 6503-E switch has a 4RU chassis, holds 3 slots, and delivers 180 Gbps of switching bandwidth per slot. The Cisco Catalyst 6503-E switch can support 97 1-Gigabit Ethernet access ports, up to 99 Gigabit Ethernet fiber access ports, up to 34 10-Gigabit Ethernet ports, and 8 40-Gigabit Ethernet ports.

The top-of-the-line Catalyst 6513-E has a 19RU, 13-slot form factor and offers up to 180 Gbps of throughput on each slot, with a system bandwidth as high as 4 Tbps. A Virtual Switching System configuration can handle 8 Tbps of switching bandwidth. The Catalyst 6513-E Series switch supports up to 529 10/100/1000 Ethernet access ports, up to 534 Gigabit Ethernet fiber ports, up to 180 10-Gigabit Ethernet connections, and up to 44 40GE access ports.

Catalyst 6800 Switches
Catalyst 6800 Series switches are campus backbone platforms intended to deliver optimal 10/40/100 Gigabit Ethernet services. The Catalyst 6880-X switch is a fixed, small form factor device for high-density Ethernet intended for small or medium-size campus cores. The Catalyst 6880-X switch delivers as much as 2 Tbps switching performance and features four slots for port cards. The maximum port density per chassis is 80 1 Gigabit Ethernet connections or 10GE access ports or as many as 20 40GE ports. Configured with Cisco's Virtual Switching System, these switches can deliver 4 Tbps switching performance and handle as many as 158 1 Gigabit Ethernet connections or 10GE access ports or as many as 20 40GE access ports.

The modular Catalyst 6807-XL switch comes in a 10 RU form factor with 7 expansion slots and supports existing Supervisor Engine 2T cards and service modules. (Two of the slots are for the Supervisor Engine and five are for expansion modules.) The Catalyst 6807-XL offers up to 880 Gbps of switching capacity per slot and a total of 11.4 Tbps of full-duplex switching throughput while providing up to 240 1 Gigabit Ethernet access ports or Gigabit Ethernet fiber connections, up to 80 10GE access ports or up to 20 40-Gigabit Ethernet connections. A two-chassis 6807-XL system with VSS is capable of supporting 22.8 Tbps of switching bandwidth, 480 1 Gigabit Ethernet connections or 1GE fiber ports, 160 10GE ports or 40 40GE connections.

How Progent Can Help You with Catalyst Series Switches
Progent can provide the remote or onsite support services of CCIE-certified network consultants who have broad backgrounds delivering Catalyst switch technology solutions for small and medium sized organizations, branches, campuses, data centers, Cloud networks, and SPs. Progent's practice areas include Cisco's Catalyst and Nexus lines of smart switches and Cisco's IOS and NX-OS control software. Consulting and support services available from Progent's experts for Catalyst Series switches include pilot testing and validation, network analysis, topology design, upgrades and project management, network virtualization, wired and wireless convergence, network management, capacity planning, troubleshooting, disaster recovery and business continuity planning, and network security and compliance testing and remediation.

Progent offers deep expertise with industry standards as well as with proprietary Cisco technologies associated with switching and routing such as Border Gateway Protocol, MPLS traffic engineering, Protocol Independent Multicast, VPNs, STP, VLANs, FabricPath, VPC, OTV, Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol, Open Shortest Path First (OSPF), VSS, and Locator/ID Separation Protocol (LISP). Progent's network specialists also offer experience with key technologies including TCP/IP protocols, IPv4, IPv6, Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol, RIP, and IGMP. Progent's CISSP-ISSAP certified data security consultants can show you how to develop a comprehensive security and compliance plan and deploy Catalyst switches so that they provide optimal support for your security posture.

In case you need ultra high density or sub-microsecond latency switches for an enterprise-class data center, Progent can assist your organization to analyze, plan, and manage a transition to Cisco's Nexus switches. To find out about Progent's consulting and support capabilities for Nexus switches, see Cisco Nexus Switch consulting and support services. Progent can also assist you to integrate Catalyst data center switches with Cisco Meraki distribution switches. (See Cisco Meraki switch integration consultants.)

To learn more information about Progent's engineering assistance for Cisco solutions, pick a subject:

• Introduction to Cisco Engineering Services
• Fast Remote Support from a Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert (CCIE) Network Engineer
• Cisco Firepower NGFW Series Firewalls: Configuration and Troubleshooting Support
• Cisco ASA 5500-X Firewall with Firepower Services: Configuration and Troubleshooting Services
• ASA 5500 Firewalls Upgrade. Migration Assistance
• PIX 500 Series Firewall Upgrade. Migration Support
• Cisco Routers Engineering Support
• Cisco Wireless Engineering Support
• Aironet APs Engineering Expertise
• Cisco Small Business 100, 300 and 500 WiFi Access Points System Design Support
• Cisco Catalyst 802.11ax Wi-Fi 6/6E Wireless APs Solution Design, Deployment and Debugging Consulting
• Cisco Wireless Controllers Integration Consulting
• Meraki Wireless APs Consulting Expertise
• Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CUCM or Unified CM) and Cisco CallManager Consulting and Technical Support
• Cisco Voice over IP Phones and IP Video Desktop Phones Consulting Services and Cisco Wireless IP Phone Integration
• Cisco Jabber Consulting and Support Services
• Nexus Switches Consulting and Support Services
• Cisco Meraki Switches Consulting and Support Expertise
• Cisco VPN and Network Security Setup and Troubleshooting Assistance
• SIP and CUBE Infrastructure Solutions: SIP Trunks and CUBE Integration Expertise
• Cisco Duo MFA Two-factor Authentication Services for At-Home Workers
• Design Solutions for Cisco-powered Data Centers
• Infrastructure Design Services for ISPs
• Unified Cloud-based and Hybrid Management Strategies for Cisco-powered Infrastructure

If you wish to contact Progent about consulting expertise for Cisco networking, phone 1-800-993-9400 or see Contact Progent.