Cisco ACI Solution Ordering Guide

July 1st, 2014

Document Version 1.1

Contents 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 2

2. Factors to Consider Before Placing an Order ........................................................................................ 2

3. Configuring the ACI Spines ................................................................................................................ 6

4. Configuring the ACI leaf switches ..................................................................................................... 8

5. Configuring the APIC Cluster ........................................................................................................... 11

6. Configuring the FEX Licenses .......................................................................................................... 14

7. Configuring AVS licenses ................................................................................................................. 16

1. Introduction

This Ordering guide is to help you configure the Cisco ACI solution, including the hardware and software components. ACI solution has following components that need to be ordered.

1. Application Policy Infrastructure Controller (APIC) Cluster: This is a cluster of 3 APIC appliances. 2. ACI Fabric Leafs: Cisco Nexus 93XX switches 3. ACI Fabric Spines: Cisco Nexus 95XX switches and/or Nexus 9336PQ fixed spine 4. ACI licenses for the 93XX leaf switches. No ACI license is needed for ACI spine switches. 5. ACI licenses for FEX support 6. AVS (Application Virtual Switch) licenses

2. Factors to Consider Before Placing an Order You need to consider the following options for factors before placing an order:

Choose ACI Fabric Spines: Cisco Nexus 9K switches

x Pick the ACI spine configuration and configure the ACI SW image with these switches

The following Nexus N9K spine switches can be enabled with ACI. Choose the spine switch that fits your architecture.

Form Factor

Nexus 9000 Switches

Description

Fixed Spine

N9K-C9336PQ

Nexus 9336 ACI Spine switch with 36p 40G QSFP

ACI-N9KDK9-11.0 ACI SW image

Modular Spine Chassis

N9K-C9508-B2

Nexus 9508 Chassis with 8 linecard slots

The B2 common equipment bundle includes 1 Sup, 3 Power Supplies, 3 Fan Trays, 2 System Controllers, and 6 Fabric Modules N9K-X9736PQ Nexus 9500 ACI Spine linecard, 36p 40G QSFP; NO other linecard type is supported in ACI mode

ACI-N9KDK9-11.0 ACI SW image; do NOT

choose the NX-OS SW image

Modular Spine Linecard

N9K-X9736PQ=

36p 40G ACI Spine Linecard spare; use this option if customer has already the 9508 chassis. Customer will have to upgrade the 9508 chassis to ACI-N9KDK9-11.0 to enable ACI mode

Please refer to the “Cisco Nexus 9500 Platform Switches” ordering guide for more information on how to configure these switches.

Choose ACI Fabric Leafs: Cisco Nexus 9K switches

x Pick the ACI leaf switch. x Consider the number of leaf ports, and the type of leaf interfaces you plan to deploy. x The following Nexus 93XX Leaf switches can be enabled with ACI licenses.

Nexus 93xx Leaf Switch Description

N9K-C9396PX

Nexus 9300 with 48p 1/10G SFP+ & 12 x 40G ports QSFP+

ACI-N9KDK9-11.0 ACI SW image; do NOT choose the NX-OS SW image

ACI-N9K-48X – ACI SW license for 48p 10G LEAF PORTS will need to be purchased to enable 48 host facing ports.

N9K-C93128TX

Nexus 9300 with 96p 1/10G-T & 8 x 40G ports QSFP+

ACI-N9KDK9-11.0 ACI SW image; do NOT choose the NX-OS SW image

ACI-N9K-96X – ACI SW license for 96p 10G LEAF PORTS will need to be purchased to enable 96 host facing ports.

Please refer to the “Cisco Nexus 9500 Platform Switches” ordering guide for information on how to configure these switches.

Choose APIC Cluster

APIC cluster connects to the fabric edge ports (leafs). You will need following information to choose your configuration:

x Number of ACI enabled Edge ports the APIC controller will be managing (i.e., Total number of leaf ports in the fabric)

x A set of APIC appliances constitute an APIC cluster. Figure out the number of APIC appliances you want to configure in the APIC cluster for scale and redundancy considerations (Minimum supported configuration is 3 APIC appliances in an APIC cluster)

x APIC appliance connects to the Edge/leaf ports. Pick the RIGHT interface type on APIC cluster to match available interface type on ACI Leaf switches (Copper or SFP)

You have the following SKUs to choose from the APIC cluster options depending on size of your deployment:

SKU DESCRIPTION

APIC-CLUSTER-M1 APIC Cluster - Medium Configurations (Up to 1000 Edge Ports)

APIC-CLUSTER-L1 APIC Cluster - Large Configurations (> 1000 Edge Ports)

Choose ACI Licenses

x ACI licenses have to be purchased for each ACI leaf switch managed by APIC. These ACI licenses are available as configurations when ordering the leaf switches.

x There are no ACI licenses for the spine switches. x Pick the appropriate ACI licenses you will need for your ACI fabric. Following licenses are

available.

SKU

(ACI License SKU) Description

Leaf Switch Supported With This ACI License SKU

ACI-N9K-48X ACI SW license for 48p 10G LEAF PORTS

N9K-C9396PX

ACI-N9K-96X ACI SW license for 96p 10G LEAF

N9K-C93128TX

PORTS

Choose ACI FEX licenses – Available on July 4th 2014

x FEX licenses have to be purchased for each FEX managed by APIC, the PID selection depends on the number of host facing ports and speed.

x The FEX licenses are available as spares ONLY. x Pick the appropriate ACI FEX licenses you will need for your ACI fabric. Following FEX licenses are

available:

SKU

(ACI License SKU) Description

ACI-F48X= ACI SW license for a 48p 1/10G Nexus 2K (SPARE)

ACI-F32X= ACI SW license for a 32p 1/10G Nexus 2K (SPARE)

ACI-F48G= ACI SW license for a 48p 1G Nexus 2K (SPARE)

Choose AVS (Application Virtual Switch) licenses – Limited orderability

x Application Virtual Switch (AVS) PIDs are for Cisco Virtual Switch that are deployed on hosts directly attached to the fabric.

x These licenses are currently ONLY available as spare option. x Choose the number of AVS instances you want to deploy, the AVS PIDs come in these options:

SKU

AVS License SKU Description

ACI-AVS-48= ACI S/W license for 48 instances (compute nodes) of AVS standard edition (Nexus 9000 direct attached fabric use cases only)

ACI-AVS-96= ACI S/W license for 96 instances (compute nodes) of AVS standard edition (Nexus 9000 direct attached fabric use cases only)

3. Configuring the ACI Spines

(i) Configuring the N9K-C9336PQ – Nexus 9336 ACI Spine switch with 36p 40G QSFP

(ii) Configuring the N9K-C9508-B2 a. Search for the N9K-C9508-B2 and select the SKU for configuration. Select options.

Note: Only the N9K-C9508-B2 SKU offers you the ACI configuration, i.e. selecting the ACI line card, ACI SW image. N9K-9508 cannot be used for ACI configuration.

b. Select the line card option

c. Select the ACI line card and choose the number of line cards you will need.

Result of selecting the N9K-X9736PQ - ACI Ready Spine Line Card - 36p QSFP 40G

d. In the ACI Software image, select the ACI-N9KDK9-11.0 image

4. Configuring the ACI leaf switches (i) Configure the N9K-C9396PX

a. Select the options

b. Select the ACI software image option. Chose ACI-N9KDK-11.0

(ii) Under the ACI Software Image, click on

(iii) Select the ACI-N9K-48X – ACI SW license for a 48 port 1/10G Nexus 9K - corresponding to the 48 host facing ports

x Notes: Do not select the Nexus 1000V Licenses option – this is for Nexus 9K NIX-OS mode.

x Similar steps when configuring the N9K-C93128TX - Nexus 93128TX switch, 1,280G, 96p

1/10G-T & 8p 40G QSFP+ � ACI software image

� Select the ACI-N9K-96X – ACI SW license for a 96 port 1/10G Nexus 9K - corresponding to the 96 host facing ports.

5. Configuring the APIC Cluster You have the following SKUs to choose from the APIC cluster options depending on size of your deployment:

SKU DESCRIPTION

APIC-CLUSTER-M1 APIC Cluster - Medium Configurations (Up to 1000 Edge Ports)

APIC-CLUSTER-L1 APIC Cluster - Large Configurations (> 1000 Edge Ports)

Step 1: Open the Cisco Commerce Workspace Tool

Go to the Cisco® Commerce Workspace configuration website by clicking https://apps.cisco.com/WOC/WOConfigUI/pages/configset/configset.jsp (Figure 1).

Figure 1 Cisco Commerce Workspace Configuration Website

Step 2: Configure the APIC-CLUSTER-M1 PID

(Note: All examples below will show APIC-CLUSTER-M1. Same process applies for APIC-CLUSTER-L1 configurations. Replace M1 with L1)

x Specify the number of APIC appliances (APIC-SERVER-M1) you want in the cluster. You need to choose “3” for quantity.

x Depending on the number of appliances you choose, you will need to configure the options for each APIC appliance. Each APIC appliance will show up in the tool as ‘APIC-SERVER-X”.

Step 3: Configure each “APIC-SERVER-X” x The APIC-SERVER-X will be pre-populated with default configurations. x You will have the options to choose from following options

1. Power supply. Choose an additional power supply if you want redundant power supply. Otherwise, 1 default power supply is built-in in the configuration.

2. Power Cable: Choose applicable power cable for your region 3. Software Image: This defaults to ACI-DK9-1.0 version. 4. PCIE options. You have two options to choose from based on the leaf host facing

connectivity:

SKU DESCRIPTION LEAF SWITCH

APIC-PCIE-CSC-02 Cisco VIC 1225 Dual Port 10Gb SFP+ CNA Choose this option if APIC controller is connecting N9K-C9396PX

UCSC-PCIE-C10T-02 Cisco VIC 1225T Dual Port 10GBaseT CNA Choose this option if APIC controller is connecting N9K-C93128TX

(i) Configure the APIC-SERVER-M1 options

(ii) Configure the power cable (iii) Select Software image

(iv) Select PCIE options

6. Configuring the FEX Licenses Available July 4th 2014

You have the following SKUs to choose for the FEX deployments:

SKU

(ACI License SKU) Description

ACI-F48X ACI SW license for a 48p 1/10G Nexus 2K

ACI-F32X ACI SW license for a 32p 1/10G Nexus 2K

ACI-F48G ACI SW license for a 48p 1G Nexus 2K

Step 1: Select the right FEX PIDs, depending on your deployment.

Example: If you have 10 Nexus 2K FEXs that are providing 48 ports of 1/10G, you will choose ACI-F48X and the license count will be 10.

7. Configuring AVS licenses In Limited Orderability

You have the following SKUs to choose for your AVS deployments:

SKU

AVS License SKU Description

ACI-AVS-48= ACI S/W license for 48 instances (compute nodes) of AVS standard edition (Nexus 9000 direct attached fabric use cases only)

ACI-AVS-96= ACI S/W license for 96 instances (compute nodes) of AVS standard edition (Nexus 9000 direct attached fabric use cases only)

You need to select the number of hosts you will be deploying AVS’ on, this will determine the number of AVS licenses you would order. These PIDs depict the AVS that are directly attached to the fabric.