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Cylindric
Asked: 2009-07-28 06:42:22 +0800 CST

Connecting two Cisco 2960 switches

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We have two Cisco 2960 switches that we need to be able to connect together.

We have four links joining SwitchA to SwitchB, I'd like to know the best way of configuring the switches so these four links are used as a trunk between them.

I guess the avilable options are Etherchannel (is this even available on the 2960?) or some other sort of link aggregation.

Many thanks,

Mark

networking cisco switch

3 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Okay, it seems to be working! I've changed the config to use LACP instead of Etherchannel. Here's what I did to configure the ports on each switch:

    SwitchA>
SwitchA> enable
SwitchA#
SwitchA# configure terminal
SwitchA(config)# interface range Gi0/21 - 24
SwitchA(config-if-range)# channel-group 1 mode active
SwitchA(config-if-range)# exit
SwitchA(config)# exit

    Checking the port status then shows

    SwitchA# show interfaces status
Port   Name Status     Vlan  Duplex Speed  Type
Gi0/1       notconnect 1     auto   auto   10/100/1000BaseTX
...
Gi0/21      connected  trunk a-full a-1000 10/100/1000BaseTX
Gi0/22      connected  trunk a-full a-1000 10/100/1000BaseTX
Gi0/23      connected  trunk a-full a-1000 10/100/1000BaseTX
Gi0/24      connected  trunk a-full a-1000 10/100/1000BaseTX
Po1         connected  trunk a-full a-1000
SwitchA#
SwitchA# show etherchannel
     Channel-group listing:
     ----------------------
Group: 1
----------
Group state = L2
Ports: 4 Maxports = 16
Port-channels: 1 Max Port-channels: 16
Protocol: LACP
Minimum Links: 0
SwitchA#
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  2. I can't tell you if those switches support EtherChannel or not. Here's the Cisco page with their indexs of examples of configuring EtherChannel: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/tech/tk389/tk213/tech_configuration_examples_list.html

    I'd give it a shot and see. Worst case it doesn't work. Pull up the docs for your specific version of the OS to see what the command syntax looks like.

    I prefer using standards-based link aggregation whenever possible (802.3ad), but doing an EtherChannel between Cisco devices is fine.

    • 1

  3. The Catalyst 2600 series supports TokenChannel, which is apparently the Token Ring equivalent of EtherChannel. Though the switches are EOL, documentation is still available for them on Cisco's Web site. If you don't have a CCO account, you'll need to sign up for a free account on their Web site to get access. Click the "Register" link in the upper right-hand corner of the cisco.com homepage. Once you're logged in, the main page for the Cat2600 series is here.

    The short of it is that there should be a "TokenChannel Configuration" choice on the Configuration Menu. Each TokenChannel can contain 2 to 4 links, so what you want to do should work. It looks like you just go into the TokenChannel config, select "Add", and it walks you through the rest.

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