Wired Intelligent Edge

Hi,

 

I am just trying to understand the different between Aruba CX 6200 vs 2930F, both of them are layer 3 and can be managed by Central, so which one to go for? How about the price difference?

Thanks,

Aamir

Hi xshant,

 

They are a similar model switch as far as speeds and feeds go. It would be fair to consider the migrating to the 6200F if you were trying to match the 2930F.

 

The Aruba CX range of switches has an entirely new Operating System - it's built as a micro-services platform with central database which means more resilient software. Of course this OS is built to leverage the new capabilities of the new Gen7 Aruba ASIC such Virtual Output Queueing (VOQ) to allow full line rate at output ports.

 

The 6200F range is likely to come at a slightly higher cost as it does have overall improved capability with features like the Network Analytics Engine (NAE) and NetEdit, that will suit you if you are looking at using automation.

 

The 2930F is a great switch. The 6200F is newer and more advanced.

As of today, there are plenty of features missing on the 6200 compared to 2930F. Depends on what you need.

Some examples:

- Can't use secondary downloadable roles on 6200; only static roles at the controller

- IP client tracking does not exist on 6200

- Device fingerprinting (and forwarding to ClearPass) does not exist on 6200

- CDP receive does not support all version; no CDP send

I also saw some critical and not so critical bugs. Like loops, ghost error counters, stack members stuck on boot, dhcp snooping not working, NetEdit failing validations, NetEdit not completing firmware update...

Fortunately they will be used for a refresh and not a new installation. Otherwise, I would not have a network.

 

If I needed something to work today, and work well, I would go with 2930F.

Ricardo, you will be happy to know that IP Client Tracker is coming to 6x00 CX switches with 10.5! I'm checking on secondary role for you.

Cloud-native microservices architecture with APIs and whatnot sure sounds nice but it's other question what does it really do for you or for your customer?

 

Currently, I don't honestly know. Even though we bought 6300F switches. Hopefully within their lifetime there will be something extra regarding AI or something. But as all the intelligence seems to be going towards Central it is interesting to see if CX switches have anything more to offer compared to 2930F.

 

Only thing I can think of for the future is if we decide to switch from MPLS in our campus network to EVPN, that is of course not supported by 2930F.

Also last Github updates for NAE scripts are 8 months ago. So I'm wondering if they are being developed or do we have to just wait Central? And of course managing NAE scripts is quite manual work?

Other than SFP56 and perpetual UPOE, I can't see today any (real world) advantage of 6200/6300F to the older Aruba switches.

I can do more with a 2930F than with CX (access use case), and it is way more stable.

Ok, I can't use Netedit with 2930F, but it lacks so many stuff (no ranges; no way to use tacacs or ldap to access it) I don't use it anyway. On the flip side, Airwave support for CX is very basic that it doesn't even show the clients that are connected.

 

Than NAE. You can't manage NAE centrally. Say you have multiple switches. You have to go to each switch to configure NAE and check the graphs or errors. And even tho you can see something is wrong with your switch within NetEdit, you must be able to access the management interface to see the details.

 

Monitoring support from other vendors is also non existent. Say you use Nagios or PRTG. No support for CX. You have to code it youself.

I tried NetEdit, but at least version 2.0.3 wasn't realy usable. While editing, NetEdit might suddenly just remove one or two configs after of before what I was editing. And ctrl+z didn't help so you had to start over. If you're supposed to edit your whole network at once with that, I really wouldn't trust it.

 

Seems 2.0.5 is the newest version not sure if they have fixed this already.

 

One semi-positive thing with 6300F is that you can mix 6300M to the same stack to get dual PSUs. Though the price difference is so much that you can just do two stacks if you need dual PSUs. Dual PSUs have not been a strong point for Aruba, 2930M and 6300M are so much more expensive than F series.

2.0.5 is the same. Copy-paste and editing stuff doesn't always work fine.

There are also some frequent "validation" errors that prevent you from applying configs.

 

Aruba also seems to be following Cisco's example, and more and more features will require a "subscription" and will only be available from the Cloud (see AOS 10). Even Central On-Premises will be "software as as service" subscription only. NetEdit is subscription only as well.

 

CX at datacenter or core is cool tho. That's 6400, 8300, 8400. VSX, VXLAN, VOQ, Multi-Tb backplane, options for up to 100G. Way better than the old 5400zl.

ricardoduarte, about device fingerprinting not existing on 6200 switches. Are you talking about something more than DHCP fingerprinting?

This:

https://community.arubanetworks.com/aruba/attachments/aruba/CampusSwitching/3714/2/ArubaOS-Switch_16-06_Device-Fingerprinting_v2018-01.pdf

 

Non existent with CX. If you want to capture user-agent you have to span the traffic. If you want to gather dhcp, you have to set up helpers on all your sites. Also can't get LLDP or CDP info into Clearpass.

 

With old 2930F, the switch will capture the first http packet, the dhcp info, lldp and cdp and forward it to ClearPass. It will then also receive the device type from ClearPass.

Also, ArubaCX 6200F doesn't  support Policy base routing, ECMP,  OpenFlow and PIM

------------------------------
Dinusha Chandrasinghe - MVP | ACMP | ACSP |ACCA
Network Engineer
Plexus Global (Pvt) Ltd
Colombo Sri Lanka
+94717327420
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: Jul 01, 2020 07:36 PM
From: Ricardo Duarte
Subject: Aruba CX 6200 vs 2930F

As of today, there are plenty of features missing on the 6200 compared to 2930F. Depends on what you need.

Some examples:

- Can't use secondary downloadable roles on 6200; only static roles at the controller

- IP client tracking does not exist on 6200

- Device fingerprinting (and forwarding to ClearPass) does not exist on 6200

- CDP receive does not support all version; no CDP send

I also saw some critical and not so critical bugs. Like loops, ghost error counters, stack members stuck on boot, dhcp snooping not working, NetEdit failing validations, NetEdit not completing firmware update...

Fortunately they will be used for a refresh and not a new installation. Otherwise, I would not have a network.

 

If I needed something to work today, and work well, I would go with 2930F.