Dell Force10 MXL Switch

Dell Force10 MXL Switch

With more bandwidth and capability for your most demanding environments, Dell announces the Dell Force10 MXL blade interconnect, a  40Gb Ethernet switch for the M1000e Blade chassis. Part of our Virtual Network Architecture, the MXL switch is designed as a high performing, high density switch that can support the most demanding workloads in traditional, virtual, public and private cloud environments. Its features include…

• Highest Performance in a Blade Switch – The MXL is Dell’s first 40GbE enabled blade switch. The introduction of this high performance, low latency switch builds on Dell’s leadership of 40Gb Ethernet shipments.
• Highest Density in a Single Blade Switch - The MXL is scalable up to six 40GbE ports., providing up to twenty four 10 GbE ports from a single blade switch using breakout cables.
• Stackable for Simplified Management– The MXL can be stacked, allowing  up to six M1000e switches to be managed using a single IP address. Stacking consolidates ports and provides a cost effective pay-as-you-grow aggregation solution.
• Scalability & Modular to Fit Your Business– The MXL can be easily upgraded with FlexIO modules to add 40GbE QSFP+, 10GbE SFP+ or 10GBase-T ports. This port flexibility allows you to add 1, 10 or 40GbE ports as your data center grows.
• Converged Networking - With the Dell Force10 MXL switch,  you can converge your SAN & LAN networks using FIP Snooping and connect to your existing FCoE forwarding device. The Force10 MXL switch is fully IEEE DCB compliant and supports a number of converged Ethernet and Fibre-Channel based storage applications.
• Feature Rich FTOS– The Force10 operating system (FTOS) provides predictable, reliable network performance while reducing operations and management overhead.  FTOS uses Industry Standard CLI with Layer 2 and Layer 3 switching and routing support and powers some of the largest and most demanding data center environments in the world.

MXLFlexIOModules

NPIVProxyGateway(NPG)technology

TheDellFCFlexIOmoduleusesNPIVProxyGateway(NPG)technology,whichprovidesthecapabilitytouseconvergedFCoEinsidetheM1000echassiswhilemaintainingtraditionalunconvergedEthernetandnativeFibreChanneloutsideoftheM1000e.WiththeFCFlexIOmodule,theMXLprovidesbridgingcapabilitiesbetweenEthernetandFibreChannelviaFCoE.TheMXLmanagesthefollowingitemswhentheFCFlexIOmoduleisinstalled: 

1.DCB(PFC,ETSandDCBx)

2.FIPdiscoveryandinitialization

3.FLOGIandFDISCconversionprocess

4.FIPkeepalives 

Forcommunicationoutsidethechassis,theMXLdirectsallEthernettrafficouttheexternalEthernetports(theseportscanbeinDCBornon-DCBmode)andconvertallFCoEpacketstonativeFCpacketsanddirectsthemoutthenativeFibreChannelportsoftheFCFlexIOmodule(s).TheMXLactsasanNPGconnectingtheconvergednetworkadapters(CNAs)intheserverstotheexternalFibreChannelfabric.WhentheFCFlexIOmoduleisinstalled,theMXLappearsasanFCFtotheCNAswhiletheFCFlexIOportsappearasNPIVN_ports(i.e.HBAports)totheexternalFibreChannelFabric.

Note:TheMXLNPIVProxyGatewaydoesnotcurrentlyprovidefabricservices.

MXL Whitepapers

Deploying the Dell Force10 MXL on a Cisco Nexus Network