24-Port Fibre Channel

The Brocade 300 is an 8 Gbps Fibre Channel switch that provides an affordable entry-level solution for small SANs or the edge of larger SANs. It enables small to medium-sized enterprises to simplify their IT infrastructures, improve system performance, maximize the value of virtual server deployments, and reduce overall storage costs.

Highly Affordable SAN Technology
The Brocade 300 provides exceptional performance and functionality at an entry-level cost. It combines auto-sensing 1, 2, 4, and 8 Gbps Fibre Channel throughput with features that greatly enhance fabric operation. The Brocade 300 provides these capabilities while consuming less than 2.5 watts of power per port for exceptional power and cooling efficiency.

The Brocade 300 features a non-blocking architecture with as many as 24 ports concurrently active at 8 Gbps (full duplex) with no over-subscription—providing an overall bandwidth of 192 Gbps. In addition, enhanced Brocade ISL Trunking enables a single logical high-speed trunk capable of up to 64 Gbps of throughput.

Simplified Management
Brocade 300 setup and configuration is simplified with the Brocade EZSwitchSetup wizard, which makes switch configuration, deployment, and management an easy three-step point-and-click process. For multiswitch environments, Brocade Network Advisor provides comprehensive management of data center fabrics, including configuration, monitoring, and management of Brocade backbones, switches, and adapters. The Brocade 300, which is Microsoft Simple SAN-compatible, also has a USB port that increases serviceability and error logging by facilitating firmware upgrades and downloads of system log files.

Fast And Easy Scalability
The Brocade 300 is easy to deploy, manage, and integrate into both new and existing IT environments. With capabilities such as Ports on Demand (PoD) scalability from 8 to 16 or 24 ports, the Brocade 300 enables organizations to grow their storage networks when necessary, in a non-disruptive manner. In addition, organizations can initially deploy 4 Gbps SFPs and upgrade to 8 Gbps SFP+ when desired.

Advanced Connectivity Options
The Brocade 300 can be deployed as a full-fabric switch or as a Brocade Access Gateway, which provides server connectivity into any SAN (the default mode setting is a switch). Access Gateway mode utilizes N_Port ID Virtualization (NPIV) switch standards to present servers as logical devices directly to the core of SAN fabrics. Attaching through NPIV-enabled switches and directors, the Brocade 300 in Brocade Access Gateway mode can connect to Brocade, McDATA, or other SAN fabrics.

Brocade 300 Specifications:

Fibre Channel ports

• Switch mode (default): 8-, 16-, and 24-port configurations (8-port increments through Ports on Demand [PoD] licenses); E_, F_, M_, FL_ Ports
• Brocade Access Gateway Default Port Mapping: 16 F_Ports, 8 N_Ports

Scalability

• Full fabric architecture with 239 switches maximum

Certified maximum

• Single Brocade FOS fabric: 56 domains, 19 hops
• Single Brocade M-Enterprise OS (M-EOS) fabric: 31 domains, 3 hops
• Larger fabrics certified as required; consult Brocade or OEM SAN design documents for configuration details

Performance

• 1.063 Gbps line speed, full duplex; 2.125 Gbps line speed, full duplex; 4.25 Gbps line speed, full duplex; 8.5 Gbps line speed, full duplex; auto-sensing of 1, 2, 4, and 8 Gbps port speeds; optionally programmable to fixed port speed; speed matching between 1, 2, 4, and 8 Gbps ports

ISL Trunking

• Brocade Frame-based Trunking with up to eight 8 Gbps ports per ISL trunk with optional license; up to 64 Gbps per ISL trunk (8 ports × 8 Gbps [data rate])
• Exchange-based load balancing across ISLs with DPS included in Brocade Fabric OS

Aggregate bandwidth

• 192 Gbps: 24 ports × 8 Gbps (data rate)

Maximum fabric latency

• 700 ns with no contention, cut-through routing at 8 Gbps

Maximum frame size

• 2112-byte payload

Frame buffers

• 700 dynamically allocated, 484 maximum per port

Classes of service

• Class 2, C lass 3, C lass F (inter-switch frames)

Port types

• FL_Port, F_Port, M_Port (Mirror Port), and E_Port; optional port type control
• Brocade Access Gateway mode: F_Port and NPIV-enabled N_Port

Data traffic types

• Fabric switches supporting unicast, multicast (255 groups) and broadcast

Media types

• 8 Gbps: Brocade 300 requires Brocade hot-pluggable SFP+, LC connector; 8 Gbps SWL, LWL, ELWL
• 4 Gbps: Brocade 300 requires Brocade hot-pluggable SFP+, LC connector; 4 Gbps SWL, LWL, ELWL

The Brocade 6505 is a 24-port, entry-level switch that provides exceptional price/16 Gbps performance value, combining flexibility, simplicity, and enterprise-class functionality. Delivering market-leading Gen 5 Fibre Channel technology, the Brocade 6505 switch is the industry's easiest SAN switch to install, manage, and support.

Exceptional Price/Performance for Growing SAN Workloads
The Brocade 6505 combines market-leading throughput with an affordable switch form factor, making it ideal for growing SAN workloads. The 24 ports produce an aggregate 384 Gbps full-duplex throughput; any eight ports can be trunked for 128 Gbps Inter-Switch Links (ISLs). Exchange-based Dynamic Path Selection (DPS) optimizes fabric-wide performance and load balancing by automatically routing data to the most efficient and available path in the fabric. It augments Brocade ISL Trunking to provide more effective load balancing in certain configurations.

In addition, the Brocade 6505 provides a low Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) thanks to a 12-port base configuration, easy administration, 1U footprint, and low-energy consumption—0.22 watts per Gbps and 3.3 watts per port. Enterprise-class capabilities combined with a low TCO yield 40 percent higher performance compared to 10 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) alternatives at a similar cost.

Industry-Leading Technology That Is Flexible, Simple, and Easy to Use
The Brocade 6505 delivers industry-leading Gen 5 Fibre Channel technology within a flexible, simple, and easy-to-use solution. The base configuration includes 12 ports, with up to 24 ports on demand. In addition to providing best-in-class scalability, the Brocade 6505 is easy to deploy with the Brocade EZSwitchSetup wizard and Brocade ClearLink Diagnostic Ports (D_Ports) feature, which simplifies setup.

A Building Block for Virtualized, Private Cloud Storage
The Brocade 6505 provides a critical building block for today's highly virtualized, private cloud storage environments. It simplifies server virtualization and Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) management while meeting the high-throughput demands of Solid State Disks (SSDs). The Brocade 6505 also supports multi-tenancy in cloud environments through Quality of Service (QoS) and fabric-based zoning features.

Brocade Access Gateway Mode
The Brocade 6505 can be deployed as a full-fabric switch or as a Brocade Access Gateway, which simplifies fabric topologies and heterogeneous fabric connectivity (the default mode setting is a switch). Brocade Access Gateway mode utilizes N_Port ID Virtualization (NPIV) switch standards to present physical and virtual servers directly to the core of SAN fabrics. This makes Brocade Access Gateway transparent to the SAN fabric, greatly reducing management of the network edge. The Brocade 6505 in Brocade Access Gateway mode* can connect servers to NPIV-enabled Brocade B-Series, Brocade M-Series, and other SAN fabrics.

Organizations can easily enable Brocade Access Gateway mode via Brocade Network Advisor or a CLI. Key benefits of Brocade Access Gateway mode include:

• Improved scalability for large or rapidly growing server and virtual server environments
• Reduced management of the network edge, since Brocade Access Gateway does not have a domain identity and appears transparent to the core fabric
• Support for heterogeneous SAN configurations without reduced functionality for server connectivity

* Brocade Access Gateway mode for the Brocade 6505 is supported only in 24-port configurations.

The Brocade VDX 6730 Switch is a 10 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) fixed configuration switch with LAN and native Fibre Channel ports. It supports multiple connectivity options, Ethernet storage connectivity for Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE), iSCSI, NAS, and bridges to Fibre Channel Storage Area Networks (SANs).

Brocade VDX 6730 Models:

• Brocade VDX 6730-32 76 ports, 1U chassis (24 10GBe LAN ports and 8 8Gbps Fibre Channel Ports)
• Brocade VDX 6730-76 76 ports, 2U chassis (60 10GBe LAN ports and 16 8Gbps Fibre Channel Ports)

Brocade VDX 6730 Features:

• Comprehensive Layer 2 LAN capabilities: Supports protocols such as Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP) and 802.1Q. The Brocade VDX 6730 is also ready for IPv4/IPv6 Layer 3 routing capabilities, which can be implemented in a future Brocade Network OS release.
• High-bandwidth efficiency across trunks: Maximizes performance with hardware-based ISL trunking and wire-speed ports with ultra-low port-to-port latency. 
• Lowest power consumption: Features superior size and the industry’s lowest power consumption—imperative in today’s data centers. 
• Scale-out solution for virtualized data centers: Enables dynamic, large-scale server virtualization deployments in private (IT customers within an enterprise) and public (external customers of managed service providers) clouds with proven scalability capabilities and Layer 2 Equal Cost Multi-Path (ECMP).
• Local switching: Delivers high performance for intra-rack traffic in virtualized environments, providing ultra-low latency of 600 nanoseconds for the same ASIC on the switch. This helps organizations design a network with no oversubscription for deterministic network performance and improved application response times, making the Brocade VDX 6730 ideal for performance-demanding environments.