Cisco MDS 9216 (DS-C9216-K9) Full Product Description

1. Short Sales Title

2. Official Product Overview

Core Hardware Differentiators vs Fixed MDS 9100 Series Switches

1. Modular expandable architecture: Built-in 16×1/2G FC base ports plus one universal hot-swappable expansion slot supporting MDS 9000 family port/services modules (MPS-14/2, 16-port FC cards, encryption/replication modules) to scale total port count up to 30 FC ports or add IP storage gateway functions (iSCSI/FCIP)Cisco. All MDS 91xx switches are fixed-port without expansion slots.
2. 3RU rack height modular chassis design, separate supervisor ASIC control plane integrated on backplane, shared hardware architecture with MDS 9500 directors for unified spare inventory and migration pathsManualsLib.
3. Heavy-duty dual 845W high-wattage redundant AC power supplies, supporting fully populated expansion module load without power bottlenecks (MDS 91xx fixed switches use 300W/500W low-wattage PSUs).
4. Native multi-protocol hardware support: Integrated IP storage gateway capability via modular MPS-14/2 service cards with 2×1G Ethernet ports for FCIP and iSCSI SAN extension across IP networks, a feature absent from base MDS 9100 fixed switchesCisco.
5. Full FICON mainframe storage protocol hardware acceleration for IBM enterprise mainframe tape/disk connectivity, built-in fabric zoning, IVR inter-VSAN routing and multi-service SAN module compatibility for encryption, remote replication and analytics.

Core High-Availability Design

Model Suffix Breakdown

• DS-C: Cisco MDS storage switch part number prefix
• 9216: MDS 9200 original modular fabric series, 16 integrated base 1/2G Fibre Channel ports + single expansion slot
• K9: Standard AC power SKU with full multilayer SAN feature license (HV DC telecom variant sold separately, PSUs/fans non-interchangeable between AC/HV SKUs)

Chassis Port & Hardware Layout Definition

1. Front Base Fibre Channel Ports: 16×hot-swappable SFP slots, autosensing 1Gbps / 2Gbps Fibre Channel, all full non-blocking line-rate bandwidth
   • Ports 1–16: Integrated base FC ports hardwired to chassis backplane
2. Front Modular Expansion Slot: Single empty bay for pluggable MDS 9000 service/port modules
   • MPS-14/2 Multiprotocol Services Module: 14×FC SFP ports + 2×1G Ethernet ports for iSCSI/FCIP
   • 16-port FC port cards for additional host/storage ISL capacity
3. Out-of-Band Management Interfaces
   • RJ45 RS232 serial console port for local CLI access
   • DB-9 legacy COM port for industrial terminal connectivity
   • Isolated 10/100BASE-T Ethernet out-of-band management port for remote SSH/Telnet/SNMP
   • Onboard flash storage for SAN-OS image upgrades and configuration backup
4. Front Diagnostic LED Bank: Global system status, power supply A/B, fan tray, base FC port, expansion module port, link/activity, fault alarm, UID blue beacon indicator
5. Rear Compartment Layout: Dual independent hot-swappable 845W AC power supply bays supporting 1+1 N+1 power redundancy
6. Front lower fan bay: Single integrated multi-fan hot-swappable variable-speed fan tray
7. Airflow Specification: Fixed front-to-back cold air intake at port panel, hot air exhausted from rear power supply compartment (cold aisle standard only, no reversed hot-aisle airflow hardware option)

Supported Transceivers & Expansion Modules

1. Fibre Channel SFP transceivers (sold separately):
   • DS-SFP-FC-2G-SW: 2Gbps short-wave multimode (500m)
   • DS-SFP-FC-2G-LW: 2Gbps long-wave single-mode (10km)
   • Backward compatible with 1G FC SFPs for legacy storage interoperation
2. Expansion module compatibility: MPS-14/2 multi-protocol service module, MDS 9000 FC port cards, encryption/replication service modules
3. Power supply compatibility: Only 845W AC PSUs for DS-C9216-K9; HV DC power supplies exclusive to telecom variant, non-interchangeable hardware
4. No built-in Ethernet downlink ports; IP gateway functions only available via modular MPS service card

3. Hardware & Physical Specifications

Core SAN Switching & Routing Performance

• Total non-blocking fabric aggregate capacity: 512 Gbps full-duplex system-wide bandwidth
• Wire-speed forwarding rate: Up to 512 Mpps Fibre Channel frame switching at full 2G line rate
• Dynamic shared packet buffer pool optimized for OLTP database and tape backup burst I/O
• FC address table capacity: 1,048,576 N_Port identifiers for large blade server rack deployments
• Maximum VSANs: 4094 isolated virtual storage fabrics
• Maximum active zone sets: 256 zone sets, up to 2000 zones per fabric
• Jumbo FC frame MTU support: Up to 9000 bytes
• Port modes supported: F (Fabric host), FL (Loop), TL (Extended Loop), E (ISL), TE (Extended ISL), NP (NPV edge host)
• Link aggregation: PortChannel for multi-port FC ISL trunking, maximum 8 FC ports per logical bundle
• NPV/NPIV native feature: Consolidate thousands of server host ports upstream to MDS core directors without core fabric overhead
• Multi-protocol ASIC support: Native FICON, FCIP, iSCSI, Fibre Channel multi-stack processing

Power & Cooling System

• Power supply bays: 2 hot-swappable redundant slots, each 845W AC PSU fully powers full chassis independently (1+1 N+1 failover protection)
• AC input voltage range: 100–240V 50/60Hz universal auto-ranging AC
• Fan tray: Single integrated multi-fan hot-swappable assembly; minimum full fan tray functional to avoid thermal shutdown, single fan failure triggers SNMP alert
• Real-time monitoring: Fan RPM, internal chassis temperature, PSU voltage, SFP optical power, port and module fault logging via console syslog and SNMP v1/v2c/v3 traps
• Typical power consumption: 185W fully populated with 16×2G SFPs + MPS-14/2 expansion module under full traffic load

Physical & Environmental Parameters

• Rack form factor: 3 RU standard 19-inch horizontal rack mount
• Dimensions (H × W × D): 13.34 cm × 44.45 cm × 57.82 cm (5.25 × 17.5 × 22.75 inches; extended depth 70.37cm with cable management guide)Cisco
• Bare chassis weight: 14.1 kg (31 lbs) without power supplies/fan tray/expansion module; fully loaded max weight 20.4 kg (45 lbs) with dual PSUs, fan tray and populated MPS expansion card installedCisco
• Operating temperature range: 0°C to 40°C (32°F–104°F); certified altitude up to 2000 metersCisco
• Storage temperature range: -40°C to 70°C (-40°F–158°F)
• Relative humidity: 10%–90% non-condensing operating; 5%–95% non-condensing storageCisco
• Compliance Certifications: FCC Class A, UL 60950-1, CE, VCCI Class A, NEBS Level 3, RoHS compliant

Integrated Supervisor Control Plane Interfaces

• Dual local CLI access: RJ45 RS232 serial port + DB-9 legacy COM terminal port
• Dedicated isolated 10/100BASE-T out-of-band Ethernet management port
• Onboard flash storage for offline SAN-OS image and configuration archives
• Front panel multi-status LED bank for real-time hardware health visibility

4. Full SAN-OS Multilayer Feature Set (Cisco SAN-OS Release 1.x / 2.x)

Layer 2 Fibre Channel Switching & Fabric Services

• VSAN Virtual Storage Area Network: Logical fabric isolation for multi-application/multi-tenant storage segmentation
• Hard port zoning + soft WWN zoning for granular host-storage access control
• Full FICON protocol support for IBM mainframe disk/tape storage connectivity
• Inter-Switch Link (ISL) trunking, PortChannel load balancing across multiple 2G FC ports
• DTP Fibre Channel trunk negotiation, FSPF fabric dynamic domain ID routing
• Local SPAN, RSPAN remote SAN traffic mirroring for storage performance troubleshooting
• Broadcast/multicast storm suppression per FC port to eliminate fabric flooding outages
• NPV N_Port Virtualizer edge switch mode for large core-edge SAN scaling

Multilayer Storage Routing & Multi-Protocol Features

• FSPF Fibre Channel Shortest Path First dynamic fabric routing for multi-switch SAN topologies
• PIM-SM IP multicast for cross-fabric backup replication traffic
• Static FC route configuration for cross-VSAN inter-fabric connectivity
• Licensed IVR Inter-VSAN Routing feature for controlled data movement between isolated VSANs
• FCIP / iSCSI multi-protocol gateway via MPS-14/2 expansion module for IP-based SAN extension across WAN links
• FICON tape/disk virtualization for enterprise mainframe storage consolidation

Advanced SAN QoS & Traffic Prioritization

• Four hardware priority queues per Fibre Channel port for tiered storage traffic classification
• Ingress frame policing, egress bandwidth shaping to throttle low-priority backup/replication streams
• Pre-built QoS templates for production OLTP, tape backup, and disaster recovery replication streams
• Dedicated high-priority queue for low-latency database and virtualization I/O workloads

Enterprise SAN Security Suite

• Port security: Static WWN locking to block unauthorized server/storage device attach
• RBAC Role-Based Access Control granular CLI user privilege partitioning
• SSHv2 encrypted remote CLI management, SNMPv3 secure monitoring, encrypted startup configuration files
• DH-CHAP mutual authentication for ISL inter-switch link fabric authentication
• Port lockdown, VSAN read-only access permissions, full audit logging for all fabric configuration changes
• Compatible with external MDS SSM encryption and replication service modules

Monitoring & SAN Management Tools

• Cisco Fabric Manager / DCNM-SAN centralized graphical SAN fabric monitoring and provisioning
• Isolated out-of-band Ethernet management port for offline device access during fabric outages
• Onboard flash storage for SAN-OS image upgrades and configuration backup archives
• Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) automatic MDS fabric neighbor device discovery
• Real-time storage telemetry: Port throughput, latency, frame error counters, SFP optical power diagnostics
• Event notification via email, syslog and SNMP traps for fabric fault alerting

5. High Availability Capabilities (Core Differentiators vs MDS 9124-K9 Fixed Switch)

1. Dual hot-swappable high-wattage 845W AC redundant power supplies (1+1 power failover protection, stable under fully populated expansion module load)
2. Hot-swappable integrated fan tray with live OIR replacement without SAN outage
3. Expandable modular expansion slot for multi-protocol IP gateway or additional FC port density (no upgrade chassis swap required)
4. Native multi-protocol FCIP/iSCSI gateway capability via MPS service module, absent from fixed MDS 9100 series switches
5. Modular shared architecture with MDS 9500 directors for unified spare inventory and seamless fabric migration
6. VSAN fabric isolation limits fault domains to single virtual storage segment, preventing fabric-wide broadcast storms
7. FSPF dynamic routing automatic failover to alternate ISL paths with sub-second convergence
8. Limitation: Legacy 2G Fibre Channel generation only, no native 4G/8G/16G/32G FC support, fixed front-to-back airflow only, integrated supervisor cannot be hot-swapped, single fan tray limited fault tolerance vs four-fan modern MDS 9132T/9148V models

6. Typical Deployment Scenarios

1. Mid-Size Enterprise Multi-Floor Building Distribution SAN Aggregation Switch
   3RU rack modular form factor deployed as departmental core SAN switch; 16 built-in 2G FC ports connect primary disk storage arrays, expansion MPS-14/2 module adds host ports and FCIP inter-building trunk links to central MDS 9500 director, creating segmented VSAN production/test/backup fabrics.
2. Medium Regional Mission-Critical Headquarters SAN
   Financial, healthcare and government headquarters storage deployments require full dual power hardware redundancy to avoid backup tape library and database storage outages; integrated FICON module support enables mainframe DR replication workflows with IP WAN FCIP extension.
3. Medium Service Provider Multi-Tenant PoP Edge Storage Switch
   VSAN isolation feature logically separates dozens of enterprise customer storage environments on a single physical MDS 9216 modular switch, reducing hardware TCO for medium carrier PoP edge storage workloads with expandable port capacity for growing customer base.
4. Legacy MDS 9000 SAN Fabric Consolidation
   Interoperable bridge switch between older 2G MDS 9120 fixed edge switches and modern MDS 9500 core directors, supporting seamless SAN fabric migration and uniform SAN-OS management across mixed-generation MDS hardware fleets.
5. Disaster Recovery Centralized Tape Backup Fabric Core
   Deployed as dedicated backup SAN aggregation switch, utilizing high-speed ISL trunk links to primary production SAN fabrics via FCIP IP extension for off-site asynchronous tape replication and long-term archive storage consolidation.

7. Standard Package Contents

Items Sold Separately (Not Included)

• Dual 845W AC hot-swappable redundant power supply units
• Single integrated hot-swappable multi-fan tray
• Optional MPS-14/2 multi-protocol FC/iSCSI/FCIP expansion service module
• DS-SFP-FC-2G-SW / DS-SFP-FC-2G-LW Fibre Channel SFP optical transceivers for base FC ports and expansion module slots
• RS232 serial console rollover cable, DB-9 COM terminal cable
• Onboard flash memory upgrades for SAN-OS image storage expansion
• Fibre channel patch cords, cable management accessories, rack cable guides
• Optional IVR inter-VSAN routing software license

Short Commercial Catalog Version (For Quotation & Datasheet Use)