Switching

I have a pair of EX3300-24T switches which are not new and I am using to further my understanding and skills around configuring switching.  I had already linked the two devices using some 1Gbps SFPs I had so that I could create some bridged vlans between the two appliances.  This all worked great until I decide to upgrade the trunk link from 1Gbps to 10Gbps.  In performing the change I installed my 10Gbps SFP+s into slots xe-0/1/3 on each device; I had previously used ge-0/1/0.

No, unbeknownst to me, the xe-0/1/3 ports are configured to be used as VCP ports and as soon as I connected the switch together on this port the devices started the process of establishing themselves as a virtual chassis and in doing so removed all of the configuration from the linecard device.

This behaviour was neither desirable or anticipated but try as I might the only way I can successfully revoke these changes has been to remove the link between them and then factory reset them both. I did not have a rescue configuration and whilst I have spent some time researching the steps needed nothing seemed to work as expected and I wasn't even able to review the setting on the linecard switch as whenever I remoted into either switch the console brought up the master only.

I know I have a lot to learn about virtual switches, which has moved way up my todo list as of today, but:

I these a set of bullet-proof steps I could/should have followed remove both EX3300 devices from the virtual chassis and ideally have them both revert to the config they had prior to inserting the fibre cable between them, or at the very least disabling the automatic VC setup when either xe-0/1/2 or xe-0/1/3 are connected between devices?

Thanks in advance,

J.

Sounds like the switches are using automatic virtual chassis port conversion to join as a virtual chassis pair.

You can prevent this automated behavior by setting:

set virtual-chassis no-auto-conversion

This document describes more about the auto port conversion feature.

https://www.juniper.net/documentation/us/en/software/junos/virtual-chassis-qfx/topics/concept/virtual-chassis-ex4200-components.html#understanding-virtual-chassis-components__auto-vcp-conversion

I have a pair of EX3300-24T switches which are not new and I am using to further my understanding and skills around configuring switching.  I had already linked the two devices using some 1Gbps SFPs I had so that I could create some bridged vlans between the two appliances.  This all worked great until I decide to upgrade the trunk link from 1Gbps to 10Gbps.  In performing the change I installed my 10Gbps SFP+s into slots xe-0/1/3 on each device; I had previously used ge-0/1/0.

No, unbeknownst to me, the xe-0/1/3 ports are configured to be used as VCP ports and as soon as I connected the switch together on this port the devices started the process of establishing themselves as a virtual chassis and in doing so removed all of the configuration from the linecard device.

This behaviour was neither desirable or anticipated but try as I might the only way I can successfully revoke these changes has been to remove the link between them and then factory reset them both. I did not have a rescue configuration and whilst I have spent some time researching the steps needed nothing seemed to work as expected and I wasn't even able to review the setting on the linecard switch as whenever I remoted into either switch the console brought up the master only.

I know I have a lot to learn about virtual switches, which has moved way up my todo list as of today, but:

I these a set of bullet-proof steps I could/should have followed remove both EX3300 devices from the virtual chassis and ideally have them both revert to the config they had prior to inserting the fibre cable between them, or at the very least disabling the automatic VC setup when either xe-0/1/2 or xe-0/1/3 are connected between devices?

Thanks in advance,

J.

Thanks Steve.  Much appreciated.

A follow question if I may.

When I run the

show interfaces terse

on my EX3300 devices I can only see the ge-0/1/0 (xe-0/1/0) and the ge-0/1/1 (xe-0/1/1) interfaces in the list.  Not the other two, even though one of them has a device in it, which I see if I run

show chassis hardware

I think it's still behaving as though the virtual-chassis has some configuration over it but I can't see how to get the interface to behave as a normal, i.e. not VC, one.

Is there anything else I can try?

My two EX3300 devices are the same major firmware revision (12.3) but one is running R12 and the the other R11 - They are second hand and just for learning on.

Sounds like the switches are using automatic virtual chassis port conversion to join as a virtual chassis pair.

You can prevent this automated behavior by setting:

set virtual-chassis no-auto-conversion

This document describes more about the auto port conversion feature.

https://www.juniper.net/documentation/us/en/software/junos/virtual-chassis-qfx/topics/concept/virtual-chassis-ex4200-components.html#understanding-virtual-chassis-components__auto-vcp-conversion

I have a pair of EX3300-24T switches which are not new and I am using to further my understanding and skills around configuring switching.  I had already linked the two devices using some 1Gbps SFPs I had so that I could create some bridged vlans between the two appliances.  This all worked great until I decide to upgrade the trunk link from 1Gbps to 10Gbps.  In performing the change I installed my 10Gbps SFP+s into slots xe-0/1/3 on each device; I had previously used ge-0/1/0.

No, unbeknownst to me, the xe-0/1/3 ports are configured to be used as VCP ports and as soon as I connected the switch together on this port the devices started the process of establishing themselves as a virtual chassis and in doing so removed all of the configuration from the linecard device.

This behaviour was neither desirable or anticipated but try as I might the only way I can successfully revoke these changes has been to remove the link between them and then factory reset them both. I did not have a rescue configuration and whilst I have spent some time researching the steps needed nothing seemed to work as expected and I wasn't even able to review the setting on the linecard switch as whenever I remoted into either switch the console brought up the master only.

I know I have a lot to learn about virtual switches, which has moved way up my todo list as of today, but:

I these a set of bullet-proof steps I could/should have followed remove both EX3300 devices from the virtual chassis and ideally have them both revert to the config they had prior to inserting the fibre cable between them, or at the very least disabling the automatic VC setup when either xe-0/1/2 or xe-0/1/3 are connected between devices?

Thanks in advance,

J.

Thanks Steve.  Much appreciated.

A follow question if I may.

When I run the

show interfaces terse

on my EX3300 devices I can only see the ge-0/1/0 (xe-0/1/0) and the ge-0/1/1 (xe-0/1/1) interfaces in the list.  Not the other two, even though one of them has a device in it, which I see if I run

show chassis hardware

I think it's still behaving as though the virtual-chassis has some configuration over it but I can't see how to get the interface to behave as a normal, i.e. not VC, one.

Is there anything else I can try?

My two EX3300 devices are the same major firmware revision (12.3) but one is running R12 and the the other R11 - They are second hand and just for learning on.

Sounds like the switches are using automatic virtual chassis port conversion to join as a virtual chassis pair.

You can prevent this automated behavior by setting:

set virtual-chassis no-auto-conversion

This document describes more about the auto port conversion feature.

https://www.juniper.net/documentation/us/en/software/junos/virtual-chassis-qfx/topics/concept/virtual-chassis-ex4200-components.html#understanding-virtual-chassis-components__auto-vcp-conversion

I have a pair of EX3300-24T switches which are not new and I am using to further my understanding and skills around configuring switching.  I had already linked the two devices using some 1Gbps SFPs I had so that I could create some bridged vlans between the two appliances.  This all worked great until I decide to upgrade the trunk link from 1Gbps to 10Gbps.  In performing the change I installed my 10Gbps SFP+s into slots xe-0/1/3 on each device; I had previously used ge-0/1/0.

No, unbeknownst to me, the xe-0/1/3 ports are configured to be used as VCP ports and as soon as I connected the switch together on this port the devices started the process of establishing themselves as a virtual chassis and in doing so removed all of the configuration from the linecard device.

This behaviour was neither desirable or anticipated but try as I might the only way I can successfully revoke these changes has been to remove the link between them and then factory reset them both. I did not have a rescue configuration and whilst I have spent some time researching the steps needed nothing seemed to work as expected and I wasn't even able to review the setting on the linecard switch as whenever I remoted into either switch the console brought up the master only.

I know I have a lot to learn about virtual switches, which has moved way up my todo list as of today, but:

I these a set of bullet-proof steps I could/should have followed remove both EX3300 devices from the virtual chassis and ideally have them both revert to the config they had prior to inserting the fibre cable between them, or at the very least disabling the automatic VC setup when either xe-0/1/2 or xe-0/1/3 are connected between devices?

Thanks in advance,

J.