Cisco MDS 9216i (DS-C9216i-K9) Full Product Description

1. Short Sales Title

2. Official Product Overview

Core Hardware Differentiators vs MDS 9216 / MDS 9216A

1. Built-in integrated multi-protocol services hardware: The base supervisor integrates14 FC ports + dedicated 2×1G Gigabit Ethernet portsfor native FCIP WAN SAN extension and iSCSI IP storage gateway (MDS 9216/9216A only have pure FC base ports; IP gateway requires separate MPS expansion card).
2. Purpose-built multiservice chassis design optimized for cross-site disaster recovery SAN extension, eliminating the need to consume the expansion slot for basic IP storage functions.
3. Same 3RU rack height, dual redundant 845W AC power supplies and dual hot-swappable fan trays as MDS 9216A, offering multi-fan fault tolerance (survive one fan tray failure without thermal shutdown).
4. Single universal expansion slot compatible with all MDS 9000 family modules: high-density FC port cards, SSM encryption/replication service modules, or additional MPS multi-protocol gateway cards to scale port density or add advanced storage services.
5. Unified interoperability with MDS 9500 directors, all FC SFPs and service modules cross-compatible across MDS 9200/9500 product lines for simplified spare inventory management.

Core High-Availability Design

Model Suffix Breakdown

• DS-C: Cisco MDS storage switch part number prefix
• 9216i: MDS 9200 multiservice series; integrated IP (iSCSI/FCIP) gateway built into base supervisor, 14 FC + 2 GE native ports, one expansion slot
• K9: Standard AC power SKU with full multilayer SAN enterprise feature license; DS-C9216i-HV-K9 is separate high-voltage DC telecom variant, power supplies/fans non-interchangeable between AC/HV airflow variants
• i = Integrated IP storage services on base chassis (unique identifier separating from pure FC MDS 9216/9216A models)

3. Chassis Port & Hardware Layout Definition

1. Front Base Integrated Ports (hardwired to supervisor backplane)
   • Ports 1–14: Hot-swappable SFP slots, autosensing 1Gbps / 2Gbps Fibre Channel, full non-blocking line-rate bandwidth (mixed host/storage/ISL port use)
   • GE1/GE2: Two dedicated fixed 10/100/1000BASE-T Gigabit Ethernet ports for FCIP WAN trunking and iSCSI IP storage gateway functions
2. Front Universal Expansion Bay: Single hot-swappable slot for MDS 9000 family pluggable modules
   • DS-X9232 32-port 2G FC high-density switching module
   • MPS-14/2 Multiprotocol Services Module (extra FC + GE ports for extended IP gateway capacity)
   • SSM Storage Services Module for inline tape encryption and asynchronous cross-fabric replication
3. Out-of-Band Management Interfaces
   • RJ45 RS232 serial console port for local CLI access
   • Legacy DB-9 COM terminal port for industrial terminal equipment connectivity
   • Isolated 10/100BASE-T out-of-band Ethernet management port for remote SSH/Telnet/SNMP administration
   • Onboard flash storage partition for SAN-OS firmware images and running configuration archives
4. Front Diagnostic LED Bank: Global system status, power supply A/B, fan tray, FC port, GE IP port, expansion module port, link activity, hardware fault alarm, UID blue locator beacon indicator
5. Rear Compartment Layout: Dual independent hot-swappable 845W AC power supply bays supporting 1+1 redundant power operation
6. Front lower fan bays: Two separate hot-swappable multi-fan variable-speed fan assemblies
7. Airflow Specification: Fixed front-to-back cold air intake at port panel, hot air exhausted from rear power supply compartment (cold aisle rack standard only, no reversed hot-aisle airflow hardware variant)

Supported Transceivers & Expansion Hardware

1. Fibre Channel SFP transceivers (sold separately):
   • DS-SFP-FC-2G-SW: 2Gbps short-wave multimode, 500m transmission reach
   • DS-SFP-FC-2G-LW: 2Gbps long-wave single-mode, 10km transmission reach
   • Backward compatible with legacy 1G FC SFPs for existing storage array interoperation
2. Expansion module compatibility: All MDS 9000 family port and multi-protocol service modules interchangeable with MDS 9500 directors
3. Power supply compatibility: 845W AC PSUs exclusive to DS-C9216i-K9; high-voltage DC 845W PSUs manufactured for DS-C9216i-HV-K9 telecom variant, airflow-specific hardware cannot be mixed between SKUs
4. Built-in GE ports do not require extra transceivers; copper RJ45 1G Ethernet native support for IP SAN extension

4. Hardware & Physical Specifications

Core SAN Switching & Routing Performance

• Single-chassis non-blocking fabric maximum aggregate bandwidth: 512 Gbps full-duplex system-wide bandwidth
• Wire-speed frame forwarding rate: Up to 512 Mpps Fibre Channel frame switching at full 2G line rate
• Dynamic shared packet buffer pool with standard buffer credit allocation for mixed OLTP, backup and replication I/O workloads
• FC N_Port address table capacity: 1,048,576 unique host identifiers for dense blade server rack deployments
• Maximum isolated VSAN virtual fabrics: 4094
• Maximum active zone sets: 256 zone sets, up to 2000 individual zone entries per VSAN
• Jumbo FC frame MTU support: Up to 9000 bytes
• Port modes supported: F (Fabric host), FL (Arbitrated Loop), TL (Extended Loop), E (ISL inter-switch trunk), TE (Extended ISL), NP (NPV edge host aggregation)
• Link aggregation: PortChannel multi-port FC ISL trunk bundling, maximum 16 FC ports per logical bundle with load balancing
• NPV/NPIV native feature: Consolidate thousands of server host ports upstream to MDS core directors without core fabric overhead
• Native multi-protocol ASIC processing: Integrated FICON, FCIP, iSCSI, Fibre Channel multi-stack hardware offload

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 alternating current
• Fan trays: Two separate hot-swappable multi-fan assemblies; minimum two functional fan trays required to avoid thermal shutdown, single fan tray failure triggers SNMP fault alert without SAN traffic interruption
• 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 full-load power consumption: 190W fully populated with 14×2G SFPs + MPS expansion module under maximum storage traffic load
• MTBF: 280,000 hours under standard enterprise data center operating conditions

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 installed)
• Bare chassis weight: 14.1 kg (31 lbs) without power supplies/fan tray/expansion card; fully loaded max weight 20.4 kg (45 lbs) with dual PSUs, dual fan trays and populated MPS expansion module
• Operating ambient temperature range: 0°C to 40°C (32°F–104°F); certified altitude up to 2000 meters
• Storage temperature range: -40°C to 70°C (-40°F–158°F)
• Relative humidity: 10%–90% non-condensing operating; 5%–95% non-condensing storage
• Compliance Certifications: FCC Class A, UL 60950-1, CE, VCCI Class A, NEBS Level 3, RoHS compliant per regional environmental regulations

Control Plane Out-of-Band Management Interfaces

• Dual local CLI access: RJ45 RS232 serial port + legacy DB-9 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

5. Full SAN-OS Multilayer Feature Set (Cisco SAN-OS MDS Release 2.x / 3.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 Smart 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 mixed 1G/2G FC ports (max 16-port bundles)
• DTP Fibre Channel trunk negotiation, FSPF fabric dynamic domain ID routing
• Local SPAN, RSPAN remote SAN traffic mirroring for multi-session 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 asynchronous synchronous 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
• Native FCIP / iSCSI multi-protocol gateway via built-in GE ports (no expansion card required for basic IP SAN extension)
• FCIP tunnel compression, write acceleration and tape pipelining for long-distance WAN disaster recovery

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 MDS SSM encryption and replication service modules for data-at-rest tape security

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, configuration backup archives and syslog export
• 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
• GOLD generic online diagnostics for continuous hardware health validation without traffic interruption

6. High Availability Capabilities (Core Differentiators vs MDS 9216-K9 / MDS 9216A-K9)

1. Dual hot-swappable high-wattage 845W AC redundant power supplies (1+1 power failover protection, stable under fully populated expansion module load)
2. Dual independent hot-swappable fan trays with multi-fan fault tolerance (survive one fan tray failure without SAN outage; MDS 9216 only single fan tray limited fault resilience)
3. Full OIR Online Insertion and Removal support for fan trays, power supplies and FC SFPs; live FRU replacement without chassis power cycle or SAN traffic drop
4. Integrated native 2×1G GE IP storage ports on base supervisor (MDS 9216/9216A require separate MPS expansion card to enable FCIP/iSCSI gateway functions, consuming the only expansion slot)
5. Universal expansion slot compatible with all MDS 9000 family port and multi-protocol service modules for future port density or advanced storage service scaling
6. Unified spare part inventory shared with MDS 9500 directors to reduce enterprise hardware maintenance costs
7. VSAN fabric isolation limits fault domains to single virtual storage segment, preventing fabric-wide broadcast storms
8. FSPF dynamic routing automatic failover to alternate ISL paths with sub-second convergence
9. 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, no modern NX-OS automation or EVPN interoperability features

7. Typical Deployment Scenarios

1. Mid-Size Enterprise Multi-Floor Building Distribution Multiservice SAN Switch
   3RU modular rack form factor deployed as departmental core SAN gateway; 14 built-in 2G FC ports connect primary disk storage arrays and blade servers, native GE ports provide FCIP inter-building WAN trunk links without consuming the expansion slot, leaving the expansion bay free for additional FC port modules or encryption services.
2. Medium Regional Mission-Critical Headquarters SAN
   Financial, healthcare and government headquarters storage deployments require complete dual power + dual-fan hardware redundancy to avoid backup tape library and database storage outages; integrated FICON support enables long-distance cross-site DR replication via FCIP IP WAN extension.
3. Medium Service Provider Multi-Tenant PoP Edge Storage Gateway
   VSAN isolation feature logically separates dozens of enterprise customer storage environments on a single physical MDS 9216i switch, reducing hardware TCO for medium carrier PoP edge storage workloads with native built-in IP gateway ports for core backbone interconnection.
4. Legacy MDS 9216 / MDS 9124 SAN Hardware Refresh Upgrade
   Drop-in performance upgrade for pure-FC MDS 9216 fixed fabric switches, fully backward compatible with existing 1G/2G Fibre Channel SFPs while unlocking native integrated FCIP/iSCSI IP storage gateway capability without purchasing extra expansion hardware.
5. Centralized Enterprise Tape Library Backup Fabric Core
   Deployed as dedicated backup SAN aggregation switch, utilizing built-in GE FCIP ports to create asynchronous off-site tape replication links to disaster recovery secondary storage fabrics, leaving the expansion slot available for high-density host port expansion as business storage capacity grows.

8. Standard Package Contents

Items Sold Separately (Not Included)

• Dual 845W AC hot-swappable redundant power supply units (airflow color-matched hardware non-interchangeable with HV telecom variants)
• Dual matching hot-swappable variable-speed fan trays
• Optional MDS 9000 family pluggable expansion modules (MPS-14/2 multi-protocol gateway, DS-X9232 32-port FC switching module, SSM storage encryption/replication module)
• DS-SFP-FC-2G-SW / DS-SFP-FC-2G-LW Fibre Channel SFP optical transceivers for all base FC ports (backward compatible with 1G FC SFPs)
• Optional IVR Inter-VSAN Routing multilayer software license
• RS232 serial console rollover cable, DB-9 legacy COM terminal cable
• Fibre channel patch cords, cable management accessories, rack cable guides

Short Commercial Catalog Version (For Quotation & Datasheet Use)