The Cisco Supervisor Engine serves as the management card for modular Cisco switches that can also, in some cases, act as forwarding/routing element.
Over time, the Supervisor Engine has undergone multiple iterations and was different for different modular switches in Cisco Portfolio (Catalyst 4000, 4500, 5000, 5500, 6000, 6500, 9400, 9600 and Nexus switches).
Supervisor Engine typically offers management of entire chassis in modular system, control over its power (PSU, Power Supply Units), cooling (fans) and physical management interfaces, as well as Line Cards (LCs) that host its own physical interfaces to serve user traffic.
Some models of Supervisor Engines can also process traffic, albeit at reduced scale and speed. Typically, traffic processing is distributed to line cards (LCs), which host their own NPUs (Network Processing Units) or ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) that are programmed by Supervisor to properly forward, filter and otherwise process user traffic. Supervisor Engines can also host switching matrix, that connects line cards together and allows for faster traffic transport between ports on different line cards, as well as can support traffic replication for multicast.
Cisco uses CEF (Cisco Express Forwarding) to create forwarding and routing tables, that in modular switches and routers is distributed using dCEF (distributed CEF). Line Cards that offer distributed forwarding & routing run their own copy of CEF tables thanks to dCEF.
Abridged list of features:
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802.1q VLAN
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Spanning Tree Protocol
The Spanning Tree Protocol (STP) is a network protocol that builds a loop-free logical topology for Ethernet networks. The basic function of STP is to prevent bridge loops and the broadcast radiation that results from them. Spanning tree al ...
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Ether Channel
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Jumbo Frames
* (E)IGRP, OSPF, RIP (2), Static Routing
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BGP
Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) is a standardized exterior gateway protocol designed to exchange routing and reachability information among autonomous system (Internet), autonomous systems (AS) on the Internet. BGP is classified as a path-vect ...
,
IS-IS
Intermediate System to Intermediate System (IS-IS, also written ISIS) is a routing protocol designed to move information efficiently within a computer network, a group of physically connected computers or similar devices. It accomplishes thi ...
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QOS
* Layer 3 and 4 Switching
Specifications
Details
Supervisor Engine I
*
68EC040
* Chassis: 2900, 2948G, 2980G, 4000, 4500, 5000, 5500, 6000, 6500, 7600
Supervisor Engine II
* MIPS
R4700
* Chassis: 2926, 4000, 4500, 5000, 5500, 6000, 6500, 7600
Supervisor Engine II+
* MIPS
R4700
* Cisco Express Forwarding
* Chassis: 2926, 4000, 4500, 5000, 5500, 6000, 6500, 7600
Supervisor Engine III
* Cisco Express Forwarding
* Max DRAM: 256MB SD
* Redundant Capable
* Netflow accelerator card
Supervisor Engine IV
* Cisco Express Forwarding
* Max Flash: 64MB (supplemental Compact Flash optional)
Supervisor Engine V
* Cisco Express Forwarding
* Chassis: 4500
Supervisor Engine 6
* Cisco Express Forwarding
* Chassis: 4500 "E" Series
Supervisor Engine 32
* Cisco Express Forwarding
* Chassis: 6000, 6500, 7600
* A low cost, reduced version of the 720
* Policy Feature Card 3b
* MSFC 2A?
Supervisor Engine 720
* Cisco Express Forwarding
* Policy Feature Card 3A, 3B, 3BXL
* Chassis: 6500, 7600
MSFC1-3
* Multi-Layer Switch Feature Card
See also
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Cisco IOS
The Internetworking Operating System (IOS) is a family of proprietary network operating systems used on several router and network switch models manufactured by Cisco Systems
Cisco Systems, Inc. (using the trademark Cisco) is an American ...
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Catalyst switch
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Catalyst 6500
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Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series Switches
References
*http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps663/products_tech_note09186a00801a5d58.shtml
*http://www.ciscosystems.com/en/US/prod/collateral/switches/ps5718/ps4324/product_data_sheet09186a00801fcaba.pdf
*http://www.cisco.ac/application/pdf/en/us/guest/products/ps4324/c1167/ccmigration_09186a008011b8da.pdf
*http://www.berkcom.com/resources/cisco/C6500_ccmigration_09186a00800887fd.pdf
*http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps663/products_tech_note09186a0080094645.shtml
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{{refend
Cisco products
Cisco Systems