Overview:
The Juniper Networks QFX5100 line of access and aggregation switches delivers low latency, flexible deployment options, and rich Layer 2 and Layer 3 features, making it the industry’s most nimble family of switches.
Featuring Topology-Independent In-Service Software Upgrades (TISSU*) and support for L2 gateway capabilities for bridging between virtualized and baremetal servers, the QFX5100 is designed for the most demanding, high-performance data center deployments. Highly flexible, the QFX5100 can be deployed in mixed 1GbE, 10GbE, and 40GbE environments within Juniper Virtual Chassis, Virtual Chassis Fabric, Junos Fusion and QFabric architectures, as well as within industry-standard architectures such as spine and leaf and Layer 3 fabrics.
Product Description
The highly flexible, high-performance Juniper Networks QFX5100 line of Ethernet switches provides the foundation for today’s and tomorrow’s dynamic data center. As a critical enabler for IT transformation, the data center network supports cloud and software-defined networking (SDN) adoption, as well as rapid deployment and delivery of applications. Mission-critical applications, network virtualization, and integrated or scale-out storage are driving the need for more adaptable networks. With its diverse set of deployment options, including fabric, Layer 3, and spine and leaf, the QFX5100 is the universal building block for data center switching architectures, enabling users to easily adapt as requirements change over time.
The QFX5100 line includes 10GbE (fiber and copper) and 40GbE fixed-configuration options with rich Layer 2, Layer 3, and MPLS features. The QFX5100 runs the same reliable, highperformance Juniper Networks Junos operating system that is used by Juniper Networks QFabric family of products, EX Series Ethernet Switches, Juniper Networks routers, and Juniper Networks SRX Series Services Gateways, ensuring a consistent implementation and operation of control plane features across the entire Juniper infrastructure.
Featuring a built-in Insight Technology capability, the QFX5100 provides valuable performance and troubleshooting data via microburst monitoring and hotspot statistics. The QFX5100 can also be used as a high-performance QFabric Node in Juniper’s highscale QFabric System or as a Satellite device in a Junos Fusion fabric architecture, deployed in Juniper’s new Virtual Chassis Fabric switching architecture, and installed in Juniper’s existing Virtual Chassis switching architecture.
Architecture and Key Components:
The QFX5100 includes the following capabilities. Please refer to the Specifications section for features that are currently shipping vs. those that will be available in a future software release.
QFX5100 Highlights
- High-density configurations—72 ports of 10GbE in a 1 U platform; 96 ports of 10GbE in a 2 U platform; and 32 ports of 40GbE in a 1 U platform
- Up to 2.56 Tbps Layer 2 and Layer 3 performance and as low as 550 ns latency1
- 1.5 GHz dual-core Intel CPU with 8 GB memory and 32 GB SSD storage
- High availability with the industry’s only Topology-Independent In-Service Software Upgrade (TISSU)
- Rich automation capabilities with support for Python, Chef, Puppet, and zero-touch provisioning (ZTP)
- Designed-in Insight Technology software capability for microburst monitoring and reporting, as well as hotspot statistics and visibility
- Plug-and-play deployable architectures such as Virtual Chassis, Virtual Chassis Fabric, Junos Fusion and QFabric System with simplified management and operation
- Support for virtualization protocols such as Virtual Extensible LAN (VXLAN), Open vSwitch Database (OVSDB) protocol, and integration with Juniper Networks Contrail and VMware NSX SDN controllers
- Advanced Junos OS features such as BGP Add-path, MPLS, L3 VPN, and IPv6 6PE
- Investment protection enabled by compatibility with Juniper Networks EX4300 Ethernet Switch, QFX3500 Switch, and QFX3600 Switch in integrated fabric solutions
QFX5100 Switch Models
The QFX5100 line includes four compact 1 U models and one 2 U model, each providing wire-speed packet performance, very low latency, and a rich set of Junos OS features. In addition to a high throughput Packet Forwarding Engine (PFE), the performance of the control plane running on all QFX5100 models is further enhanced with a powerful 1.5 GHz dual-core Intel CPU with 8 GB of memory and 32 GB SSD storage.
- QFX5100-48S: Compact 1 U 10GbE data center access switch with 48 small form-factor pluggable and pluggable plus (SFP/ SFP+) transceiver ports and six quad SFP+ (QSFP+) ports with an aggregate throughput of 1.44 Tbps or 1.08 Bpps per switch.
- QFX5100-48T: Compact 1 U 10GbE data center access switch with 48 tri-speed (10GbE/1GbE/100 Mbps) RJ-45 ports and six QSFP+ ports with an aggregate throughput of 1.44 Tbps or 1.08 Bpps per switch.
- QFX5100-24Q: Compact 1 U high-density 40GbE data center access and aggregation switch starting at a base density of 24 QSFP+ ports with the option to scale to 32 QSFP+ ports with two four-port expansion modules. All 32 ports support wire-speed performance with an aggregate throughput of 2.56 Tbps or 1.44 Bpps per switch.
- QFX5100-24Q-AA: Compact 1U high-density data center switch starting with a base density of 24 QSFP+ ports. With the addition of an optional double-wide QFX-PFA-4Q Packet Flow Accelerator (PFA) expansion module, the switch can morph into an intelligent application acceleration system. Alternatively, by installing two four-port 40GbE expansion modules, the QFX5100-24Q-AA can expand to support 32 QSFP+ ports. The switch’s CPU subsystem is enhanced with a quad-core Intel CPU with 32 GB of DRAM; additional storage capacity is provided via an onboard 128 GB solid-state drive. The QFX-PFA-4Q features an Altera Stratix V 320 Gbps FPGA with 24 GB SDRAM (DDR3) for packet memory and 72 MB of quad data-rate static RAM (SRAM) (QDR2+) for low-latency processing.
- QFX5100-96S: Compact 2 U high-density 10GbE aggregation switch with 96 SFP+/SFP and eight QSFP+ ports with an aggregate throughput of 2.56 Tbps or 1.44 Bpps per switch.
For added flexibility, the 40GbE ports on all QFX5100 switches can be used as 4x10GbE ports using QSFP+ to SFP+ direct attach copper (DAC) or QSFP+ to SFP+ fiber splitter cables and optics. With splitter cables, the QFX5100-48S supports up to 72 10GbE ports, while the QFX5100-24Q and QFX5100-96S support up to 104 10GbE ports.
Junos Space Network Director
The QFX5100 switches can be managed through Junos Space Network Director, a next-generation network management solution that allows users to visualize, analyze, and control the entire enterprise network—data center and campus, physical and virtual, wired and wireless—through a single pane of glass. Network Director incorporates sophisticated analytics for realtime intelligence, trended monitoring, and automation to increase agility as well as faster rollout and activation of services.
For cloud deployments, Network Director provides a set of REST APIs that enable on-demand and dynamic network services by simplifying the consumption of services for multitenant environments. With third-party cloud orchestration tool integration, the Network Director API enables automation and provisioning of Layer 2, Layer 3, and security services in the data center without the need for manual operator intervention.
Virtual Chassis Technology
The QFX5100 supports Juniper Networks’ unique Virtual Chassis technology, which enables up to 10 interconnected switches to be managed and operated as a single, logical device with a single IP address. Virtual Chassis technology enables enterprises to separate physical topology from logical groupings of endpoints and, as a result, provides efficient resource utilization. All QFX5100 switches can participate in the same Virtual Chassis configuration, along with any combination of EX4300, QFX3500, and QFX3600 Ethernet switches, delivering highly flexible and scalable configuration options for data center deployments.
Virtual Chassis Fabric Switching Architecture
Existing Virtual Chassis technology is further scaled and enhanced to support a spine-and-leaf topology that is ideal for highperformance and low-latency data center deployments. In its first instance, this topology, called Virtual Chassis Fabric, enables up to 20 QFX5100 switches to be deployed in a spine-and-leaf configuration, with two to four QFX5100s in the spine and up to 18 QFX5100s as leaf nodes. This architecture provides any-rack-toany-rack deterministic throughput and less than 3 microseconds of latency, while significantly simplifying network operations through a single point of management. EX4300, QFX3500, and QFX3600 switches can also act as leaf nodes in a Virtual Chassis Fabric deployment, providing support for data centers with mixed 1GbE, 10GbE, and 40GbE servers as well as environments transitioning from 1GbE to 10GbE or 40GbE servers while protecting existing EX4300, QFX3500, and QFX3600 investments.
The QFX5100 also supports a Layer 2 VxLAN Gateway feature in Virtual Chassis Fabric mode, creating a single Hardware VTEP for an entire Virtual Chassis Fabric pod (a single management domain of up to 20 devices) that would exist on all nodes. Virtual Chassis Fabric enables a plug-and-play architecture; hence no VTEP configuration changes are required when adding or removing nodes from the Virtual Chassis Fabric pod. For MAC address learning, Virtual Chassis Fabric supports both EVPN as well as OVSDB, and also integrates with VMware NSX.
Junos Fusion
Junos Fusion, an IEEE 802.1Br standards-based Ethernet fabric, is ideal for mid-to-large data center customers who want simplicity at scale.
The open, easy-to-deploy Junos Fusion provides a single point of management and plug-and-play operation for networks with a choice of 1GbE, 10GbE and 40GbE for server access. In a Junos Fusion deployment, QFX5100 switches are deployed as Satellite devices that are managed by the QFX10000 switches deployed as Aggregation devices. (see Figure 1).
Figure 1: Junos Fusion deployments using QFX1000 switches as Aggregation devices and EX4300 and QFX5100 switches as Satellite devices.
QFabric System
The QFX5100-48S and QFX5100-48T can also act as a QFabric Node device in a QFX3000-M and QFX3000-G QFabric System. The QFX5100-48S and QFX5100-48T are fully interoperable with existing QFX3500 and QFX3600 QFabric Nodes, providing backward compatibility and investment protection. With a mixture of QFX3500, QFX3600, and QFX5100 Nodes, a QFabric System can scale on a node by node basis without being limited by the lowest common denominator.
Data Center Deployments
Today’s data centers are built with high-performance, small form-factor, multicore blade and rack servers. The greater compute capacity and server densities enabled by these devices is increasing traffic levels, creating the need for high-speed, lowlatency, storage- and I/O-converged networking solutions that can maximize performance for physical servers, virtual servers, and storage in the data center.
The QFX5100 line offers a portfolio of switches that deliver the low-latency, lossless, high-density 10GbE and 40GbE interfaces with the Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) transit switch functionality demanded by today’s data center. All QFX5100 models are designed to consume the lowest power possible while optimizing space, thereby reducing data center operating costs. Flexible airflow direction options enable the QFX5100 to support back-to-front and front-to-back cooling, ensuring consistency with server designs for hot- and cold-aisle deployments.
Data Center Server Access
The QFX5100 line of switches is ideal for top-of-rack deployments of various densities and speeds. The compact 1 U QFX5100-48S offers 48 ports of native 10GbE for server connectivity and up to six 40GbE ports for uplink connectivity, providing very low oversubscription of 2:1 from access to aggregation. Each 40GbE port can be further broken out into four 10GbE ports, providing additional 10GbE for server connectivity.
The QFX5100-48T offers 48 RJ-45-based 10GbE ports and up to six 40GbE ports for providing uplinks to aggregation switches. Each RJ-45 port can operate in three different speeds, providing 10GbE, 1GbE or 100 Mbps server connectivity using the same shielded twisted pair copper cables. Distances up to 100m can be supported using cables that conform to IEEE 802.3-2012 specifications, enabling the QFX5100-48T to be deployed as a top-of-rack, middle-of-row or end-of-row switch.
The 2 U QFX5100-96S is a high-density native 10GbE data center access switch that is ideal for deployments with a high degree of application redundancy. The highly efficient QFX5100-96S offers 96 ports of native 10GbE for server connectivity and eight 40GbE ports for uplink connectivity, providing very low oversubscription of 3:1 from access to aggregation.
The QFX5100-24Q offers 24 QSFP+ ports in the base unit with an option to scale up to 32 QSFP+ ports with two four-port expansion modules. Each QSFP+ port can be used for native 40GbE server port connectivity or channelized into four 10GbE ports for 10GbE server connectivity, offering maximum flexibility and investment protection for data center growth.
Each of the QFX5100 switches can operate in both cut-through and store-and-forward modes, delivering sustained wirespeed switching with sub-microsecond latency and low jitter for any packet size (including jumbo frames) in both modes. All QFX Series switches support extensive Layer 2 features, enabling the device to support high-density 10GbE/FCoE Layer 2 access deployments. With features such as multi-chassis link aggregation group (MC-LAG), the QFX5100 supports active/active server dual homing and can utilize full bisectional bandwidth from server to switch. When the QFX5100 is deployed in the access layer, MC-LAG on QFX10000 switches in the aggregation layer provides maximum resiliency and full Layer 2 multi-pathing in the network (see Figure 2).
Figure 2: QFX5100 at the access layer
The Junos operating system features the most advanced and robust routing capabilities in the industry. All QFX5100 switches include support for RIP and OSPF for both IPv4 and IPv6 in the base software. Advanced routing capabilities such as IS-IS and BGP are also supported. With additional capabilities like 64-way equal-cost multipath (ECMP) and BGP add path, the QFX5100 is an ideal building block for deploying the most robust Layer 3 underlay for software-defined networks (SDN) (see Figure 3).
Figure 3: Larger scale data center with Layer 3 to the access
In addition, the QFX5100 also supports Virtual Chassis Fabric and QFabric System deployments. These fabric technologies support both Layer 2 multi-pathing and Layer 3 ECMP paths within the same network fabric while dramatically reducing the number of user configured protocols, thus eliminating the need to run protocols such as Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP) for Layer 3 gateway load balancing and complex multicast protocols to set up replication trees. Virtual Chassis Fabric and QFabric technology dramatically reduce the complexity and cost of managing the data center network by making multiple switches appear as a single, logical device. Virtual Chassis Fabric allows up to 20 individual switches to be managed via a single CLI, while a QFabric System enables up to 128 Nodes to operate as a single device (see Figures 4 and 5).
Figure 4: Virtual Chassis Fabric data center deployment with a mix of 1GbE and 10GbE
1 40GbE-to-40GbE port on QFX5100-24Q only
