Cisco NCS 5500 Modular Chassis: Second-Generation Fabric and Fan Modules Data Sheet

The second generation of Cisco NCS 5500 fabric cards and fan trays enhance the per-slot forwarding capacity of NCS 5500 by 2.7 times.

Product overview

The Cisco Network Convergence System 5500 Series offers industry-leading density of routed 100 Gigabit Ethernet (100 GE) ports for high-scale WAN aggregation. The NCS 5500 Series is designed to efficiently scale between data centers and large enterprises, web, and service provider WAN and aggregation networks. With the introduction of the second generation of fabric cards and fan trays, the forwarding capacity of NCS 5500 modular or line-card-based routers will be augmented by 2.7 times. The second-generation fabric cards and fan trays replace the first generation and a seamless upgrade will be supported. The upgrade will serve to support newer generation NCS 5700 line cards on the three existing variants of modular chassis, NCS5504, NCS 5508 and NCS 5516. Note that the new generation of fabric cards and fan trays are not compatible with their respective previous generation and hence should not be mixed with the first generation of fabric cards and fan trays.

The new fabric cards will offer double the switching capacity per fabric compared to the previous generation, to 1.8 Tbps. And the six fabric cards per chassis will offer up to a total of 10.8 Tbps per slot of bandwidth for every line card. The new fan trays are hot-swappable and will continue to provide front-to-back cooling for all the modules in the chassis. Each fan tray will cover two fabric modules and there will be a total of three fan trays to cover six fabric cards in the system. The second-generation fabric and fans are backward-compatible with all the line cards currently supported on the NCS 5500 Series and are absolutely required for the NCS 5700 line cards with 400GE and 100GE interface ports.

This second generation of fabric cards and fan trays for 16-slot chassis and 8-slot chassis and 4-slot chassis are currently shipping.

Software requirements

The second-generation fabric cards and fan trays for NCS 5500 Series 16-slot chassis (NCS-5516) and 8-slot chassis (NCS-5508) will be supported on Cisco IOS XR Software Release 6.6.25 or later and for NCS-5504 chassis, the second generation fabric cards and fan trays are supported on Cisco IOS XR Software Release 7.2.2 or later.

Features and benefits

Table 1 outlines the features and benefits of the second-generation fabric cards and fan trays for the NCS 5500. Table 2 outlines the new cards’ and trays’ specifications. Table 3 outlines the environmental properties.

Table 1.        Features and benefits

Table 2.        NCS 5500 2^nd generation Switch Fabric Specifications

Table 3.      NCS 5500 2^nd generation Fan Tray Specifications

Table 4.        Environmental properties

Table 5.        Regulatory standards compliance: Safety and EMC

Read additional information related to NCS 5500 regulatory compliance and safety standards.

Ordering information

Table 6.        Ordering information Fabric, Fan modules and Software

For details on the Cisco Network Convergence System 5500 Series Perpetual Software Licenses, refer to this data sheet and details on the flexible consumption model for the NCS 5500 Series are available in the data sheet for the IOS XR Software flexible consumption model.

Warranty information

The Cisco NCS 5500 Series has a 1-year limited hardware warranty. The warranty includes hardware replacement with a 10-day turnaround from receipt of a Return Materials Authorization (RMA).

Cisco environmental sustainability

Information about Cisco’s environmental sustainability policies and initiatives for our products, solutions, operations, and extended operations or supply chain is provided in the “Environment Sustainability” section of Cisco’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Report.

Reference links to information about key environmental sustainability topics (mentioned in the “Environment Sustainability” section of the CSR Report) are provided in the following table:

Cisco makes the packaging data available for informational purposes only. It may not reflect the most current legal developments, and Cisco does not represent, warrant, or guarantee that it is complete, accurate, or up to date. This information is subject to change without notice.

Service and support

Cisco offers a wide range of services to help accelerate your success in deploying and optimizing the Cisco NCS 5500 Series. These innovative Cisco Services offerings are delivered through a unique combination of people, processes, tools, and partners, and they are focused on helping you increase operating efficiency and improve your data center network. Cisco Advanced Services use an architecture-led approach to help you align your data center infrastructure with your business goals and achieve long-term value.

Cisco SMARTnet Service helps you resolve mission-critical problems with direct access at any time to Cisco network experts and award-winning resources. With this service, you can take advantage of the Cisco Smart Call Home service, which offers proactive diagnostics and real-time alerts on your Cisco NCS 5500 Series. Spanning the entire network lifecycle, Cisco Services offerings help increase investment protection, optimize network operations, support migration operations, and strengthen your IT expertise.

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For more information

For more information about the Cisco NCS 5500 Series, visit Cisco Network Convergence System 5500 Series.

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