Product Overview
Figure 1. The Cisco Nexus 5000 Series includes the Cisco Nexus 5020 that supports 10 Gigabit Ethernet, Cisco Data Center Ethernet, and FCoE

Cisco Nexus 5020 56-Port Switch
Expansion Module Options
• An Ethernet module that provides six ports of 10 Gigabit Ethernet, Cisco Data Center Ethernet and FCoE via SFP+ interface.
• A Fibre Channel plus Ethernet module that provides four ports of 10 Gigabit Ethernet, Cisco Data Center Ethernet and FCoE via SFP+ interface and four ports of 1/2/4 Gbps native Fibre Channel connectivity via SFP interface.
• A Fibre Channel module that provides eight ports of 1/2/4 Gbps native Fibre Channel via SFP interface for transparent connectivity with existing Fibre Channel networks. (future)
Figure 2. From Left to Right: 6-Port 10 Gigabit Ethernet, Cisco Data Center Ethernet, and FCoE Module; 4-Port Fibre Channel plus 4-Port 10 Gigabit Ethernet, Cisco Data Center Ethernet, and FCoE Module; 8-Port Native Fibre Channel Expansion Module

Efficient Transceiver and Cabling Options
• For in-rack or adjacent-rack cabling, the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series supports SFP+ direct attached 10 Gigabit Ethernet copper, an innovative solution that integrates transceivers with Twinax cables into an energy-efficient, low-cost, and low-latency solution. SFP+ direct attached 10 Gigabit Twinax copper cables uses only 0.1 watt (W) of power per transceiver and introduces only approximately 0.25 microsecond of latency per link.
• For longer cable runs, the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series supports multimode, short-reach optical SFP+ transceivers. These optical transceivers use approximately 1W per transceiver and have latency of less than 0.1 microsecond.
Figure 3. The Cisco Nexus 5000 Series Supports SFP+ Direct Attached 10 Gigabit Copper for In-Rack Cabling, and Optical Solutions for Longer Connections

Compatibility with Consolidated Adapters
Features and Benefits
• The combination of high port density, lossless Ethernet, wire-speed performance, and extremely low latency makes the switch an ideal product to meet the growing demand for 10 Gigabit Ethernet with the capability to support Cisco Data Center Ethernet in enterprise and service provider data centers, protecting enterprises' investments. The switch family has sufficient port density to support single or multiple racks fully populated with blade and rack-mount servers.
• Built for today's data centers, the switches are designed just like the servers they support. Ports and power connections are at the rear, closer to server ports, helping keep cable lengths as short and efficient as possible, delivering benefits traditionally offered on blade servers to rack servers as well. Hot-swappable power and fan modules can be accessed from the front panel, where status lights offer an at-a-glance view of switch operation. Front-to-back cooling is consistent with server designs, supporting efficient data center hot- and cold-aisle designs. Serviceability is enhanced with all customer-replaceable units accessible from the front panel. The use of SFP+ ports offers increased flexibility to use a range of interconnect solutions, including copper Twinax cable for short runs and fiber for long runs.
• Cisco Data Center Ethernet features increase network scalability, support I/O consolidation, ease management of multiple traffic flows, and optimize performance. Although implementing SAN consolidation requires only the lossless fabric provided by the Ethernet pause mechanism, the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series provides additional features that create an even more easily managed, high-performance, unified network fabric. Cisco Data Center Ethernet features supported by the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series are outlined in Table 1.
Table 1. Cisco Data Center Ethernet Features and Benefits
• FCoE is part of the unified network fabric that enables I/O consolidation at the rack level. It is a straightforward encapsulation of Fibre Channel within Ethernet that preserves existing Fibre Channel network management models and tools, helping protect investments in software and staff training. Additional switch features include delayed drop, which helps increase resiliency after bursts of traffic, and Ethernet Host Virtualizer (EHV), which supports higher performance and massive scalability (Table 2).
Table 2. Additional Switch Features and Benefits
• I/O consolidation in racks and rows helps reduce capital and operational costs by reducing the number of server adapters, cables, and upstream switches needed to support I/O at the rack level. Rather than the overhead of a redundant pair of adapters for each of up to three networks (LAN, SAN, and cluster), I/O consolidation supports all three networks on a single link. The switch family connects to native Fibre Channel networks, protecting existing investments in storage networks. The switch family's support for FCoE also supports data center I/O consolidation. As FCoE-enabled switching becomes available across the data center, FCoE traffic can travel over a unified network fabric directly to future FCoE-enabled storage devices or to native Fibre Channel SANs.
• Energy efficiency achieved through the use of the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switches helps data centers better operate within their space, power, and cooling parameters while reducing their carbon footprints. Every network link at the rack level requires adapters, switches, and transceivers, all of which consume power. I/O consolidation reduces energy consumption by eliminating the need for separate Fibre Channel adapters, cables, and switches. In many cases, server cluster networks also can be consolidated onto 10 Gigabit Ethernet networks, especially given the low latency of the Cisco Nexus 5000 Series. The switch hardware is also designed for energy efficiency. Variable-speed fans consume only the amount of power necessary to cool the chassis at any point in time. The switch power supplies are sized to support worst-case scenarios where inefficient SFP+ transceivers maximize power draw; however, when low-power cabling solutions are deployed, the switch family's power supplies maintain 90 percent efficiency at only 25 percent utilization, making efficient use of power in best-case scenarios.
• Consistent management for Cisco products is provided through consistency of both Cisco NX-OS Software and Cisco MDS 9000 SAN-OS Software management models and tools. The switch family network features can be managed using the Cisco command-line interface (CLI) , and the Fibre Channel and FCoE features can be managed through Cisco Fabric Manager Suite. In a future release Cisco Data Center Network Manager (DCNM) and Cisco VFrame will support the Nexus 5000 switch family. The capability to manage Ethernet and FCoE features independently with existing Cisco tools preserves existing management models, best practices, and investments in staff training. In addition, Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) MIBs, Extensible Markup Language (XML), and the Cisco CLI are made available to customers for switch management through third-party or custom-developed tools. The switch family is based on Cisco NX-OS for superior operational efficiency, pervasive security, and continuous operation even through software upgrades.
• Software manageability and serviceability features include Smart Call Home and automated parameter exchange (through DCBX). Security is enhanced through role-based access control (RBAC); support for authentication, authorization, and accounting (AAA), remote TACACS+, and RADIUS servers; and Secure Shell (SSH) access.
Applications
• As an access-layer switch, it can be used purely as a 10 Gigabit Ethernet switch, consolidating 10 Gigabit Ethernet connections into a smaller number of server connections trunked to the aggregation layer.
• As a rack-level I/O consolidation platform, the switch carries Ethernet traffic from servers to the aggregation layer and carries FCoE traffic to existing Fibre Channel SANs.
• As a crucial element in data center I/O consolidation, the switch paves the way with I/O consolidation at the access layer and interoperability with Cisco Nexus and other standards-based products.
Rack-Level 10 Gigabit Ethernet Access-Layer Switch
Figure 4. The Cisco Nexus 5000 Series Can Be Deployed as a Top-of-Rack, Access-Layer Switch in Parallel with Existing Fibre Channel SANs

Unified Fabric with FCoE: I/O Consolidation
Figure 5. A pair of Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switches in an active-active configuration with native Fibre Channel connections to two storage networks

Investment Protection with FCoE
Product Architecture
Cisco NX-OS Overview
Cisco NX-OS Features and Benefits
• Software compatibility: Cisco NX-OS Release 4.0 interoperates with Cisco products running any variant of the Cisco IOS Software operating system. Cisco NX-OS Release 4.0 also interoperates with any networking OS that conforms to the networking standards listed as supported in this data sheet.
• Common software throughout the data center: Cisco NX-OS simplifies the data center operating environment and provides a unified OS designed to run all areas of the data center network, including the LAN, SAN, and Layer 4 to 7 network services.
• Modular software design: Cisco NX-OS is designed to support distributed multithreaded processing on symmetric multiprocessors (SMPs), multicore CPUs, and distributed line card processors. Computationally intensive tasks, such as hardware table programming, can be offloaded to dedicated processors distributed across the line cards. Cisco NX-OS modular processes are instantiated on demand each in a separate protected memory space. Thus, processes are started and system resources allocated only when a feature is enabled. The modular processes are governed by a real-time preemptive scheduler that helps ensure the timely processing of critical functions.
• Quick development of enhancements and problem fixes: The modularity of Cisco NX-OS allows new features, enhancements, and problem fixes to be integrated into the software very quickly. Thus, modular fixes can be developed, tested, and delivered in a very short time span.
• Troubleshooting and diagnostics: Cisco NX-OS is built with unique serviceability functions to enable network operators to take early action based on network trends and events, enhancing network planning and improving network operations center (NOC) and vendor response times. Call Home and Cisco Generic Online Diagnostics (GOLD) are some of the features that enhance the serviceability of Cisco NX-OS.
– Smart Call Home: The Smart Call Home feature continuously monitors hardware and software components to provide e-mail-based notification of critical system events. A versatile range of message formats is available for optimal compatibility with pager services, standard e-mail, and XML-based automated parsing applications. It offers alert grouping capabilities and customizable destination profiles. This feature can be used, for example, to directly page a network support engineer, send an e-mail message to a NOC, and employ Cisco Auto-Notify services to directly generate a case with the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC). This feature is a step toward autonomous system operation, enabling networking devices to inform IT when a problem occurs and helping ensure that the problem is acted on quickly, reducing time to resolution and maximizing system uptime.
– Cisco GOLD: Cisco GOLD is a suite of diagnostic facilities to verify that hardware and internal data paths are operating as designed. Boot-time diagnostics, continuous monitoring, and on-demand and scheduled tests are part of the Cisco GOLD feature set. This industry-leading diagnostics subsystem allows rapid fault isolation and continuous system monitoring critical in today's continuously operating environments.
• Programmatic XML interface: Based on the NETCONF industry standard, the Cisco NX-OS XML interface provides a consistent API for devices, enabling rapid development and creation of tools to enhance the network.
• SNMP: Cisco NX-OS complies with SNMPv1, v2, and v3. A rich collection of MIBs is supported.
• RBAC: With RBAC, Cisco NX-OS enables administrators to limit access to switch operations by assigning roles to users. Administrators can customize access and restrict it to the users who require it.
Product Specifications
Performance
• Layer 2 hardware forwarding at 1.04 Tbps or 773.8 million packets per second (Mpps)
• MAC address table entries: 16,000
• Low latency cut-through design provides predictable, consistent traffic latency regardless of packet size, traffic pattern, or enabled-features
Layer 2 Features
• Layer 2 switch ports and VLAN trunks
• IEEE 802.1Q VLAN encapsulation
• Support for up to 1000 VLANs and virtual SANs (VSANs) per switch
• Rapid Per-VLAN Spanning Tree Plus (PVRST+)
• Multiple Spanning Tree Protocol (MSTP) (IEEE 802.1s): 64 instances
• Spanning Tree PortFast and PortFast Guard
• Spanning Tree UplinkFast and BackboneFast
• Spanning Tree Root Guard
• Spanning Tree Bridge Assurance (future)
• NIC teaming
• Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP) Versions 1, 2, and 3 snooping
• IGMP snooping querier
• Protocol Independent Multicast (PIM) snooping (future)
• Cisco EtherChannel® technology
• Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP): IEEE 802.3ad
• Advanced PortChannel hashing based on Layer 2, 3, and 4 information
• Multi-Chassis EtherChannel (MCEC) (future)
• Ethernet Host Virtualizer (future)
• Jumbo frames on all ports (up to 9216 bytes)
• Pause frames (IEEE 802.3x)
• Storm control (unicast, multicast, and broadcast)
• Address Resolution Protocol (ARP)
• Private VLANs
• Private VLAN over trunks
QoS
• Layer 2 IEEE 802.1p (CoS)
• 8 hardware queues per port
• Per-port QoS configuration
• CoS trust
• Modular QoS CLI (MQC) compliance
• Color-aware aggregate policing
• Policed drop
• Per-port Virtual Output Queueing
• CoS-based egress queuing
• Egress strict-priority queuing
• Egress port-based scheduling: Weighted Round-Robin (WRR)
• Ingress policing on physical Ethernet and virtual Ethernet interfaces
• Delayed drop (future)
Security
• Ingress access control lists (ACLs) (standard and extended) on Ethernet and virtual Ethernet ports
• Standard and extended Layer 2 ACLs: MAC addresses, protocol type, etc.
• Standard and extended Layer 3 to 4 ACLs: IPv4 and v6, Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP), TCP, User Datagram Protocol (UDP), etc.
• VLAN-based ACLs (VACLs)
• Named ACLs
• ACL logging and statistics
• Time-based ACLs
• Optimized ACL distribution
• IEEE 802.1X (future)
• Port security (future)
• Cisco TrustSec (future)
High Availability Features
• Hot swappable field-replaceable power supplies, fan modules, and expansion modules
• 1:1 power redundancy
• N:1 fan module redundancy
Management
• Switch management using 10/100/1000 management or console ports
• CLI-based console to provide detailed out-of-band management
• SSHv2
• Telnet
• AAA
• RADIUS
• TACACS+
• Syslog
• SNMP v1, v2, and v3
• Enhanced SNMP MIB support
• XML (NETCONF) support
• Remote Monitoring (RMON)
• Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) for management traffic
• Unified username and passwords across CLI and SNMP
• Microsoft Challenge Handshake Authentication Protocol (CHAP)
• Digital certificates for management between switch and RADIUS server
• Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) Versions 1 and 2
• Role-based Access Control (RBAC)
• Switched Port Analyzer (SPAN) on physical, PortChannel, VLAN and Fibre Channel interfaces
• Enhanced Remote SPAN (ERSPAN) (future)
• Ingress and egress packet counters per interface
• Network Time Protocol (NTP)
• Power-on self-test (POST)
• Cisco GOLD: Ethernet and Fibre Channel
• Comprehensive bootup diagnostic tests
• Call Home
• Smart Call Home
• Cisco Fabric Manager
• Cisco DCNM (future)
• Cisco VFrame (future)
Cisco Data Center Ethernet
• Priority flow control (per-priority pause frame support)
• Data Center Bridging Exchange (DCBX) Protocol
• IEEE 802.1Qaz: Bandwidth management
• IEEE 802.1Qau: Congestion management (BCN) (future)
• Layer 2 multipathing (future)
Fibre Channel Features (requires Storage Services License)
• Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE)
• Fibre Channel Protocol
• Fibre Channel standard port types: E, F, and NP
• Fibre Channel enhanced port types: TE and VF
• Up to 64 buffer credits per port
• Virtual SANs (VSANs)
• Fibre Channel (SAN) PortChannel
• Native Interop Mode 2
• Native Interop Mode 3
• VSAN trunking
• Fabric Device Management Interface (FDMI)
• Fibre Channel ID (FCID) persistence
• Dynamic port VSAN membership (future)
• Distributed device alias services
• In-order delivery
• Port tracking
• McDATA native interoperability
• N-port virtualization (NPV)
• N-port identifier virtualization (NPIV)
• QoS: 2 levels (future)
• Fabric services: Name server, registered state change notification (RSCN), login services, name-server zoning
• Per-VSAN fabric services
• Cisco Fabric Services
• Diffie-Hellman Challenge Handshake Authentication Protocol (DHCHAP) and Fibre Channel Security Protocol (FC-SP)
• Distributing device alias services
• Host-to-switch and switch-to-switch FC-SP authentication
• Fabric Shortest Path First (FSPF)
• Fabric binding for Fibre Channel
• Standard zoning
• Port security
• Domain and port
• Enhanced zoning
• SAN PortChannels
• Cisco Fabric Analyzer
• Automatic failure detection and restart of applications (future)
• Fibre Channel traceroute
• Fibre Channel ping
• Fibre Channel debugging
SNMP MIBs
Generic MIBs
• SNMPv2-SMI
• CISCO-SMI
• SNMPv2-TM
• SNMPv2-TC
• IANA-ADDRESS-FAMILY-NUMBERS-MIB
• IANAifType-MIB
• IANAiprouteprotocol-MIB
• HCNUM-TC
• CISCO-TC
• SNMPv2-MIB
• SNMP-COMMUNITY-MIB
• SNMP-FRAMEWORK-MIB
• SNMP-NOTIFICATION-MIB
• SNMP-TARGET-MIB
• SNMP-USER-BASED-SM-MIB
• SNMP-VIEW-BASED-ACM-MIB
• CISCO-SNMP-VACM-EXT-MIB
Fibre Channel MIBs
• CISCO-ST-TC
• CISCO-FC-FE-MIB
• CISCO-FCSP-MIB
• CISCO-PORT-TRACK-MIB
• CISCO-PSM-MIB
• CISCO-FC-SPAN-MIB
• CISCO-PORT-CHANNEL-MIB
• CISCO-RSCN-MIB
• CISCO-NS-MIB
• CISCO-FCS-MIB
• CISCO-DM-MIB
• FIBRE-CHANNEL-FE-MIB
• CISCO-FC-ROUTE-MIB
• CISCO-FSPF-MIB
• CISCO-ZS-MIB
• CISCO-ZS-EXT-MIB
• CISCO-VSAN-MIB
• CISCO-CFS-MIB
• CISCO-FCPING-MIB
• CISCO-FCTRACEROUTE-MIB
• CISCO-FDMI-MIB
• CISCO-FC-DEVICE-ALIAS-MIB
• CISCO-WWNMGR-MIB
• FCMGMT-MIB
• CISCO-VEDM-MIB
Ethernet MIBs
• CISCO-VLAN-MEMBERSHIP-MIB
Configuration MIBs
• ENTITY-MIB
• IF-MIB
• CISCO-ENTITY-EXT-MIB
• CISCO-ENTITY-FRU-CONTROL-MIB
• CISCO-ENTITY-SENSOR-MIB
• CISCO-FLASH-MIB
• CISCO-SYSTEM-MIB
• CISCO-SYSTEM-EXT-MIB
• CISCO-IP-IF-MIB
• CISCO-IF-EXTENSION-MIB
• CISCO-SERVER-INTERFACE-MIB
• CISCO-NTP-MIB
• CISCO-IMAGE-MIB
• CISCO-IMAGE-CHECK-MIB
• CISCO-IMAGE-UPGRADE-MIB
• CISCO-CONFIG-COPY-MIB
• CISCO-ENTITY-VENDORTYPE-OID-MIB
Monitoring MIBs
• DIFFSERV-DSCP-TC
• NOTIFICATION-LOG-MIB
• DIFFSERV-MIB
• CISCO-CALLHOME-MIB
• CISCO-SYSLOG-EXT-MIB
• CISCO-PROCESS-MIB
• RMON-MIB
• CISCO-RMON-CONFIG-MIB
• CISCO-HC-ALARM-MIB
Security MIBs
• CISCO-AAA-SERVER-MIB
• CISCO-AAA-SERVER-EXT-MIB
• CISCO-COMMON-ROLES-MIB
• CISCO-COMMON-MGMT-MIB
• CISCO-RADIUS-MIB
• CISCO-SECURE-SHELL-MIB
• TCP/IP MIBs
• INET-ADDRESS-MIB
• TCP-MIB
• CISCO-TCP-MIB
• UDP-MIB
• IP-MIB
• CISCO-IP-PROTOCOL-FILTER-MIB
• CISCO-DNS-CLIENT-MIB
Miscellaneous MIBs
• START-MIB
• CISCO-LICENSE-MGR-MIB
• CISCO-FEATURE-CONTROL-MIB
• CISCO-CDP-MIB
• CISCO-RF-MIB
Industry Standards
• IEEE 802.1D: Spanning Tree Protocol
• IEEE 802.1p: CoS prioritization
• IEEE 802.1Q: VLAN tagging
• IEEE 802.1s: Multiple VLAN instances of Spanning Tree Protocol
• IEEE 802.1w: Rapid reconfiguration of Spanning Tree Protocol
• IEEE 802.3: Ethernet
• IEEE 802.3ad: LACP
• IEEE 802.3ae: 10 Gigabit Ethernet
• SFP+ support
• RMON
Physical Specifications
SFP+ Optics
• Smallest 10 Gigabit Ethernet form-factor
• Optical interoperability with gXENPAK, X2, and XFP interface types
• Lowest power consumption
• Hot-swappable device
AC Power Supply
• Typical Operating Power: 480W
• Maximum Power: 750W
• Input voltage: 180-264 VAC
• Frequency: 47-63Hz
• Efficiency: 90% or better at full load, and maintain efficiency down to 25% load
• RoHS compliant: Yes
• Hot swappable: Yes
• Heat dissipation: 2566 BTU/hr
Environment
• Physical (Height x Width x Depth): 3.47 in. (8.8 cm) x 17.3 in. (43.9 cm) x 30.0 in. (76.2 cm)
• Operating Temperature: 0 to 40°C (32 to 104°F)
• Non-operating Temperature: -40 to 70°C (-40 to 158°F)
• Humidity: 5 to 95% (non-condensing)
• Altitude: 0 to 10,000 ft (0 to 300m)
Weight
Table 3. Weight of the Cisco Nexus 5020
