This topic has been marked solved and closed to new posts due to inactivity. We hope you'll join the conversation by posting to an open topic or starting a new one.
New to Netgear. Just looking for a point in the right direction for setting up a Lag between 2 Netgear switches with LACP, using CLI. Unfortunatly I only know CISCO, so I'm reaching out.
Thank you for using NETGEAR M4300 great series of switches.
You will find the CLI commands for LAGs and LACP in the CLI Manual starting page 491. You can find all the technical documentation in M4300 support pages, for instance here.
The CLI command is called port-channel, like at Cisco. There are 128 LAGs that are provisioned already in your M4300 switch: lag 1; lag 2; lag 3 etc. LACP is enabled by default, a command is needed to "remove" LACP and consider the LAG static instead. The LAGs can be called by their LAG name (lag 1; lag 2; lag 3; etc.) or by their slot/interface number: the <<lag 1>> unit/slot/interface number is 0/13/1, for instance. The unit is "0" because this is a virtual interface and the slot number is 13 for LAGs. Let's say you want to add Port-1 and Port-2 to <<lag 1>>, it means you want to add physical interfaces 1/0/1 and 1/0/2 from your Unit-1 switch to the virtual interface 0/13/1. Let's say you want to name this <<lag 1>> as TestLAG in your switch. Follow the logic:
(M4300-12X12F) >en
(M4300-12X12F) #config
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#port-channel ?
adminmode Enable/Disable the port-channel's administrative Mode. linktrap Enable/Disable Link Up/Down traps for this port. load-balance Configures port-channel load balance. name Configure a name for the interface port-channel. system Configure port channel system priority (LAG).
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#port-channel name lag 1 TestLAG
-or -:
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#port-channel name 0/13/1 TestLAG
1 Src MAC, VLAN, EType, incoming port 2 Dest MAC, VLAN, EType, incoming port 3 Src/Dest MAC, VLAN, EType, incoming port 4 Src IP and Src TCP/UDP Port fields 5 Dest IP and Dest TCP/UDP Port fields 6 Src/Dest IP and TCP/UDP Port fields 7 Enhanced hashing mode
- the default is 3 Src/Dest MAC, VLAN, Ethertype and incoming port - you should select the mode based on your peering device (the same mode should be selected on both ends). For instance:
1/0/1 interface is part of a port-channel. 1/0/2 interface is part of a port-channel. (M4300-12X12F) (Interface 1/0/1-1/0/2)#exit
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#exit
(M4300-12X12F) #show port-channel ?
<lag-intf-num> Enter LAG interface number. <unit/slot/port> Enter permissible interface in unit/slot/port format. all Enter 'all' for all interfaces. brief Display port-channel static capability and summary information for the device. system Display port-channel system priority.
(M4300-12X12F) #show port-channel all
Log. Channel Admin Mbr Device/ Port Port Intf Name Min Link Mode Type Ports Timeout Speed Active ------- --------------- ---- ------ ------ ---- ------- ------------- --------- ------- lag 1 TestLAG 1 Down En. Dyn. 1/0/1 actor/long 10G Full False partner/long 1/0/2 actor/long 10G Full False partner/long lag 2 ch2 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 3 ch3 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 4 ch4 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 5 ch5 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 6 ch6 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 7 ch7 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 8 ch8 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 9 ch9 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 10 ch10 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 11 ch11 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 12 ch12 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 13 ch13 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 14 ch14 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 15 ch15 1 Down En. Dyn. --More-- or (q)uit
Hope this helps, please share your thoughts about M4300 series when you can!
Thank you for using NETGEAR M4300 great series of switches.
You will find the CLI commands for LAGs and LACP in the CLI Manual starting page 491. You can find all the technical documentation in M4300 support pages, for instance here.
The CLI command is called port-channel, like at Cisco. There are 128 LAGs that are provisioned already in your M4300 switch: lag 1; lag 2; lag 3 etc. LACP is enabled by default, a command is needed to "remove" LACP and consider the LAG static instead. The LAGs can be called by their LAG name (lag 1; lag 2; lag 3; etc.) or by their slot/interface number: the <<lag 1>> unit/slot/interface number is 0/13/1, for instance. The unit is "0" because this is a virtual interface and the slot number is 13 for LAGs. Let's say you want to add Port-1 and Port-2 to <<lag 1>>, it means you want to add physical interfaces 1/0/1 and 1/0/2 from your Unit-1 switch to the virtual interface 0/13/1. Let's say you want to name this <<lag 1>> as TestLAG in your switch. Follow the logic:
(M4300-12X12F) >en
(M4300-12X12F) #config
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#port-channel ?
adminmode Enable/Disable the port-channel's administrative Mode. linktrap Enable/Disable Link Up/Down traps for this port. load-balance Configures port-channel load balance. name Configure a name for the interface port-channel. system Configure port channel system priority (LAG).
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#port-channel name lag 1 TestLAG
-or -:
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#port-channel name 0/13/1 TestLAG
1 Src MAC, VLAN, EType, incoming port 2 Dest MAC, VLAN, EType, incoming port 3 Src/Dest MAC, VLAN, EType, incoming port 4 Src IP and Src TCP/UDP Port fields 5 Dest IP and Dest TCP/UDP Port fields 6 Src/Dest IP and TCP/UDP Port fields 7 Enhanced hashing mode
- the default is 3 Src/Dest MAC, VLAN, Ethertype and incoming port - you should select the mode based on your peering device (the same mode should be selected on both ends). For instance:
1/0/1 interface is part of a port-channel. 1/0/2 interface is part of a port-channel. (M4300-12X12F) (Interface 1/0/1-1/0/2)#exit
(M4300-12X12F) (Config)#exit
(M4300-12X12F) #show port-channel ?
<lag-intf-num> Enter LAG interface number. <unit/slot/port> Enter permissible interface in unit/slot/port format. all Enter 'all' for all interfaces. brief Display port-channel static capability and summary information for the device. system Display port-channel system priority.
(M4300-12X12F) #show port-channel all
Log. Channel Admin Mbr Device/ Port Port Intf Name Min Link Mode Type Ports Timeout Speed Active ------- --------------- ---- ------ ------ ---- ------- ------------- --------- ------- lag 1 TestLAG 1 Down En. Dyn. 1/0/1 actor/long 10G Full False partner/long 1/0/2 actor/long 10G Full False partner/long lag 2 ch2 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 3 ch3 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 4 ch4 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 5 ch5 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 6 ch6 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 7 ch7 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 8 ch8 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 9 ch9 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 10 ch10 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 11 ch11 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 12 ch12 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 13 ch13 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 14 ch14 1 Down En. Dyn. lag 15 ch15 1 Down En. Dyn. --More-- or (q)uit
Hope this helps, please share your thoughts about M4300 series when you can!
Awesome write up and thank you for the timely response. The actual command I was looking for was an interface command (interface)# port lacpmode.
But that was before I realized it was enabled by default. Basically the only problems I've run into using these M4300's is from trying to turn on settings that are already on by default. You guys have really made an awesome product. You can be incredibly granular with the configurations but it comes out of the box pretty much ready to use.
Since we are here, I'd like to ask your opinion on how to set my LAG's between my ESXi host's and my Netgear switches. I have (1) M4300x48 stacked with (1) M4300 24x24. I have 6 ESXi host's with duel 10Gb base-t nic's running to the stacked switches evenly distributed for redundancy.
My question is. Should I make one LAG with all 12 ports or make 6 separate LAG's for each ESXi host? With the ESXi distributed switching, I could aggregate all 12 ports on my host's together. I see no major benefit in this because I am limited to a Quad 10GB base-t connection from the M4300's to my NAS solution.
Thank you for your candid feedback, I am sure it will help other members in our Community - and even skeptical Cisco admins on the Internet when it comes to cost-effective NETGEAR M4300 Series.
I would keep each ESXi host in its own 2-port LAG, which should be a distributed LAG across the stack - with one port on the M4300-48X first unit and one port on the M4300-24X24F second unit. I don't think the distributed switching technique (aggregating your 6 ESXi hosts into a giant 12-port LAG) is a good idea. Not only M4300's only supporting 8-port per LAG, but also I would question the hash algorithm parsing the data between the vSphere distributed switch and the physical switch. Better to stick to one "proven" individual LAG for each of your four hosts. More importantly, check the hash algorithm for the best adequation between your vswitch and the physical switch. Because all packets might target the same M4300 routing interface in a routed environment, destination MAC would be all the same and it is better to set up a Layer 3 (IP) and Layer 4 (TCP/UDP) source and destination hashing - load balance mode 6 - for the best utilization of each port in your LAGs.
That is super helpful and I appreciate the information regarding "load balance mode 6 - for the best utilization of each port in your LAGs". That was my next step to figure out.
