Full English Description for Cisco N9K-C93180YC-EX-24
1. Part Number Naming Breakdown
Model: N9K-C93180YC-EX-24
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N9K: Cisco Nexus 9000 cloud-scale data center fixed switch product family
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C93180: Hybrid SFP28/QSFP28 leaf chassis of Nexus 9300 EX enhanced generation
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Y: SFP28 multi-rate 1/10/25G fiber downlink physical slots (48 total physical ports)
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C: QSFP28 multi-rate 40/100G fabric uplink fixed ports
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EX: Enhanced EX-series Cloud Scale ASIC, larger packet buffer, expanded route table capacity, dual NX-OS standalone / ACI fabric operation modes
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24: Base license locks only 24 out of 48 SFP28 downlink ports for activation; full 48-port functionality unlockable via optional upgrade license N9K-EX-24P-UPG=
2. Short Sales One-Liner (For BOM, Quotation & Datasheet Header)
Cisco Nexus N9K-C93180YC-EX-24, 1RU rack-mount cost-optimized hybrid-port cloud leaf data center switch, 48 physical SFP28 1/10/25G downlink slots (24 ports licensed by default, upgradeable to full 48) plus 6 universal QSFP28 40/100G fabric uplink ports, 3.6 Tbps non-blocking switching capacity, dual hot-swappable Platinum-efficiency redundant power supplies and 3+1 redundant variable-speed fan trays, dual-mode standalone NX-OS or ACI intent-based fabric, optimized for small-to-medium 25G server ToR aggregation, phased data center expansion and budget-friendly multi-tenant cloud deployments.
3. Complete Product Overview Paragraph
The Cisco Nexus N9K-C93180YC-EX-24 is a compact 1RU fixed-port Layer 2/3 leaf switch belonging to the Nexus 9300 EX enhanced platform portfolio, a cost-tiered variant of the full 48-port N9K-C93180YC-EX chassis designed for phased infrastructure rollout and small-scale 25G server workloads Cisco. The hardware layout remains identical to the standard 93180YC-EX: 48 universal SFP28 physical downlink slots for server/storage access and six high-density QSFP28 multi-rate uplink ports for spine interconnection, delivering full wire-rate non-blocking forwarding with total switching bandwidth of 3.6 Tbps and forwarding throughput of 2.7 billion 64-byte minimum frames per second.
The core differentiation lies in port licensing: the EX-24 model ships with a base license enabling any random 24 of the 48 SFP28 downlink ports, while the remaining 24 physical slots are software-locked and can be fully activated later via a simple one-time license upgrade without hardware replacement, enabling customers to start small and scale port capacity as server deployments expand. All SFP28 downlink ports auto-negotiate 1G, 10G and 25G speeds with FC-FEC support for stable long-reach 25G optical links, compatible with SFP 1G, SFP+ 10G and SFP28 25G transceivers plus short passive DAC cables. Each QSFP28 uplink supports flexible independent breakout: 1×100G, 1×40G, 2×50G, 4×25G or 4×10G to match evolving fabric speed migration plans.
Powered by the EX-generation Cloud Scale ASIC, the switch provides larger shared dynamic packet buffers, increased IPv4/IPv6 route table capacity and native hardware acceleration for EVPN/VXLAN overlay routing and wire-rate MACsec encryption, outperforming first-generation classic Nexus 9300 hardware. The chassis integrates dedicated out-of-band RJ45 management, mini-USB RS232 console and single USB Type-A port to support POAP zero-touch provisioning, offline configuration backup and firmware upgrades. Dual hot-swappable power supplies and N+1 redundant fan trays eliminate single points of hardware failure, with bidirectional airflow options (PI port-side intake / PE port-side exhaust) selectable at order time to fit diverse rack thermal layouts. It supports two independent operating modes: modular standalone Cisco NX-OS for traditional routed data centers, or native ACI fabric mode for policy-driven automated multi-tenant cloud infrastructure, paired with comprehensive unsampled streaming telemetry and open DevOps automation APIs.
4. Detailed Hardware Interface Specifications
SFP28 Downlink Physical Slots (48 × Universal Multi-Rate Slots)
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Hardware total: 48 SFP28 slots; default license activates arbitrary 24 ports, upgrade license unlocks all 48
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Supported auto-negotiated speeds: 1G, 10G, 25G; FC-FEC enabled for 25G optical links
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Compatible transceivers: SFP 1G, SFP+ 10G, SFP28 25G; passive DAC cables up to 3m
QSFP28 Fabric Uplink Ports (6 × Universal Multi-Rate Slots, all unlocked by default)
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Per-port speed & breakout combinations:
1 × 100G, 1 × 40G, 2 × 50G, 4 × 25G, 4 × 10G via breakout cables / QSA adapters
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Compatible transceivers: QSFP28 100G, QSFP+ 40G, SFP28 25G, SFP+ 10G
Management & Auxiliary Ports
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1 × 10/100/1000BASE-T RJ45 out-of-band management port
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1 × Mini-USB RS232 console port for local CLI access
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1 × USB 2.0 Type-A port for firmware upload, config backup and POAP deployment
Power & Cooling
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Dual hot-swappable power supply options: 650W AC, 930W DC, 1200W HVAC/HVDC (1+1 active load-sharing redundancy, live hot-swap without traffic outage)
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3+1 redundant variable-speed fan trays, bidirectional airflow PI / PE configurable at ordering
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Power efficiency: 80Plus Platinum certified
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Operating temperature: 0°C ~ 40°C full load; storage temperature: -40°C ~ 70°C
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Humidity: 5%–95% non-condensing; maximum operating altitude: 4000m
Physical Form Factor
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Dimensions: 1RU standard 19-inch rack chassis, 4.4cm (H) × 44.5cm (W) × 57.1cm (D)
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Empty weight (without PSUs/fans): ~8.2 kg
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Compliance: RoHS-6, NEBS Level 3, global safety & EMC certifications
Core Hardware Performance Benchmarks
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Total switching capacity: 3.6 Tbps full duplex non-blocking
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Forwarding rate: 2.7 Bpps (64-byte frame wire-rate)
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Shared dynamic packet buffer: 40MB for congestion absorption
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MAC address table size: 128,000 MAC forwarding entries
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IPv4 / IPv6 unicast route table capacity: 128,000 routing entries
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VLAN support: Up to 4094 standard IEEE 802.1Q tagged VLANs
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System memory: 24GB DRAM + 64GB onboard SSD storage
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Typical cut-through switching latency: Less than 1 microsecond for minimum-size Ethernet framesCisco
5. Core Software Feature Suite (Dual NX-OS / ACI Operating Modes)
Layer 2 & Layer 3 Routing
Static routing, RIP, OSPFv2/v3, EIGRP, BGP, VRRP, PIM sparse/dense multicast, FCoE Fibre Channel over Ethernet for unified compute-storage fabrics
Cloud Fabric Overlay
Hardware-accelerated EVPN/VXLAN symmetric & asymmetric routing, multi-tenant VXLAN segmentation, fabric multicast optimization
Enterprise & Fabric Security
802.1X port authentication, MAB MAC bypass authentication, DHCP Snooping, Dynamic ARP Inspection, CoPP control-plane policing, hardware 128/256-bit MACsec encryption on all uplink ports, TrustSec SGT zero-trust segmentation
Monitoring & Telemetry
Sampled/unsampled IPFIX streaming telemetry, ERSPAN remote port mirroring, local SPAN/VSPAN, real-time buffer, queue and fabric link utilization visibility, Tetration flow export compatibility
Licensing & Scalability
Base license enables 24 SFP28 downlink ports; optional upgrade license N9K-EX-24P-UPG= unlocks full 48-port capacity without hardware replacement
Automation & DevOps
POAP zero-touch provisioning, NX-API REST JSON/XML APIs, embedded Linux Bash shell, native Python scripting, Ansible/Puppet/Chef integration, containerized application hosting, hot patching and ISSU in-service software upgrade without traffic downtime
High Availability
Modular fault-isolated process architecture, stateful process restart, redundant control plane, hot-swappable power supply and fan FRUs
6. Typical Deployment Use Cases
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Budget top-of-rack leaf switch for small-scale 25G virtualization server racks (initial 24-server capacity)
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Phased expansion leaf node: start with 24 active ports, upgrade to full 48 ports as business grows
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Converged compute/storage fabric node supporting FCoE block storage workloads for mid-size enterprises
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Entry-level leaf access node for medium-scale ACI Application Centric Infrastructure fabrics
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Hybrid migration leaf for mixed 10G/25G server generations with scalable 100G uplink capacity to spine layer
7. Datasheet Short Summary Paragraph
The Cisco Nexus N9K-C93180YC-EX-24 is a 1RU cost-optimized EX-generation hybrid-port cloud data center leaf switch with 48 physical 1/10/25G SFP28 downlink slots (24 ports licensed by default, upgradeable to full 48) plus six multi-rate 40/100G QSFP28 fabric uplink ports, delivering 3.6 Tbps non-blocking switching performance with dual Platinum redundant power and cooling hardware. Supporting both standalone modular NX-OS and ACI intent-based fabric operational modes, it features hardware EVPN/VXLAN overlay, wire-rate MACsec encryption and enterprise-grade security acceleration, serving as a flexible phased-expansion leaf aggregation switch for small-to-medium virtualized enterprise and multi-tenant cloud data centers built around 25G optical server infrastructure.
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