Cisco C9606R-A Full Product Description

1. Short Overview

Suffix Breakdown

• C9600: Catalyst 9600 high-performance modular core switch platform
• 6: Total 6 horizontal internal chassis slots
• R: Redundant high-availability hardware architecture (dual supervisor support, N+1/N+N power/fan redundancy)
• -A: Factory pre-assembled integrated chassis bundle (pre-installed supervisors, fan tray, redundant power supplies, ready for line card deployment out of box)

Core Differentiators

1. vs bare empty C9606R: C9606R is only an empty chassis with fan tray; C9606R-A comes factory pre-mounted with dual supervisors and minimum redundant power supplies for instant HA core deployment.
2. vs C9604R-A compact pre-assembled chassis: C9604R-A has only 2 line card slots; C9606R-A provides 4 line card slots for higher port scalability for medium-to-large campus backbones.
3. vs flagship C9610R-A: C9610R-A features 8 line card slots for ultra-scale deployments; C9606R-A balances rack space, cost and port density for mainstream enterprise core use cases.
4. vs Catalyst 9400 series switches: Catalyst 9400 targets distribution layer access aggregation; C9600 series including C9606R-A delivers Silicon One high-speed forwarding, native 100G/400G support and enlarged L2/L3 forwarding tables for campus/data center core backbone transport.

2. Chassis Slot Architecture & Hardware Capacity

Fixed 6 Horizontal Slot Layout (Top to Bottom 1–6)

• Slots 1 & 2: Hot-swappable line card slots
• Slots 3 & 4: Dual pre-installed redundant supervisor engine slots (1+1 HA deployment standard for C9606R-A)
• Slots 5 & 6: Hot-swappable line card slots
  Total line card expansion capacity: 4 independent line card slots for fiber/copper uplink/access modules

Backplane Bandwidth & Forwarding Performance

• Maximum wired non-blocking switching capacity: 25.6 Tbps (enabled via factory pre-installed C9600X-SUP-2 Gen2 Silicon One supervisors)
• Per-slot full-duplex wire-speed bandwidth: 6.4 Tbps
• Inter-supervisor high-speed synchronization interconnect: 400 Gbps for seamless SSO/NSF state replication
• Maximum forwarding throughput: 8 Bpps with C9600X-SUP-2; 3 Bpps if configured with Gen1 C9600-SUP-1 supervisors

Maximum Supported Port Density (4 fully populated line card slots)

1. High-speed fiber options
   • 400G QSFP-DD: Up to 8 ports total
   • 100G/40G QSFP28: Up to 128 ports total
   • 50G/25G SFP56/SFP28: Up to 224 ports total
   • 10G/1G SFP+/SFP: Up to 384 ports via QSFP breakout adapters
2. Multigigabit copper RJ45
   • Up to 192 × 10G/5G/2.5G/1G mGig UPOE++ PoE ports (compatible with Catalyst 9600 copper line cards)

Standard Factory Pre-Installed Hardware for C9606R-A Base Bundle

1. Dual redundant supervisor engines (default C9600X-SUP-2 Gen2 Silicon One supervisors with onboard SSD storage)
2. Single N+1 redundant hot-swappable fan tray with 9 integrated fans
3. Minimum 2× high-efficiency Platinum/Titanium AC power supplies for basic N+1 power redundancy (expandable to 4 PSU total for full N+N redundancy)

Supported Power Supply Modules

• 2000W / 3000W high-efficiency Platinum AC PSUs
• 2000W DC / HVDC power supply options for telco/data center environments
• Input voltage range: AC 90–264V 47–63Hz; DC -40V ~ -72V
• All PSUs meet ≥90% energy efficiency standards for low power consumption

Cooling System

• Single hot-swappable N+1 redundant fan tray with side-to-side horizontal airflow (air intake left side, exhaust right side)
• Full front-panel service access for fan tray replacement; optional rear tray access for optimized cable management
• Dynamic fan speed auto-adjustment based on internal chassis temperature to reduce acoustic noise during low-load operation

3. Physical & Environmental Specifications

Physical Dimensions & Weight

• Form factor: Standard 8 RU rack-mountable chassis
• Dimensions (H × W × D): 13.95 × 17.4 × 16.1 inches (35.43 × 44.20 × 40.89 cm)
• Base pre-assembled weight (C9606R-A with dual supervisors, 2 AC PSUs, fan tray): 69.03 lb (31.31 kg)

Operating Environmental Compliance

• Normal operating temperature: -5°C ~ +40°C up to 3000m altitude; short-term -5°C ~ +50°C up to 1800m altitude
• Storage/transport temperature: -40°C ~ +75°C
• Humidity tolerance: 10%–95% relative humidity non-condensing
• Global safety & regulatory certifications: UL 60950-1, IEC 60950-1, EN 60950-1, CSA-C22.2, GB 4943, NEBS seismic compliance, RoHS, EMC Class A for enterprise data center deployment

Hardware Asset Security

• Embedded passive UHF RFID tags integrated on chassis, pre-installed supervisors, PSUs and fan tray for centralized network asset lifecycle tracking
• ACT2 secure authentication chip on all hot-swappable modules to detect unauthorized third-party non-Cisco hardware insertion

4. Native High Availability (HA) Capabilities

1. Dual 1+1 pre-installed supervisor redundancy
   • SSO (Stateful Switchover), NSF (Non-Stop Forwarding) to eliminate packet loss during supervisor failover
   • Full ISSU (In-Service Software Upgrade) for IOS XE firmware version upgrades without traffic interruption
2. Universal OIR (Online Insertion and Removal) support
   All supervisors, line cards, power supplies and fan trays support hot plug/unplug without full chassis power shutdown
3. Modular power redundancy
   Expandable to 4 PSU bays supporting N+1 or full N+N power deployment to withstand single or multiple power supply failures
4. N+1 redundant fan tray internal fan array; single fan fault does not compromise chassis cooling performance
5. StackWise Virtual support: Two C9606R-A pre-assembled chassis can be paired to form a single logical virtual core switch for multi-chassis fabric HA

5. IOS XE Full Software & Security Feature Suite

Campus & SD-Access Fabric Core Functions

• Hardware-accelerated native VXLAN EVPN forwarding for Cisco SD-Access intent-based wired/wireless enterprise fabric
• Massive-scale L2/L3 forwarding tables (MAC address, IPv4/IPv6 route, ACL entries) optimized for multi-building large campus deployments
• Up to 32-way ECMP equal-cost multi-path uplink load balancing
• Complete routing protocol stack: BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, IS-IS
• PVLAN private VLAN segmentation, cross-card LACP/PAGP EtherChannel, MSTP/RSTP spanning tree toolkit

Hardware-Accelerated Security Features

• IEEE 802.1AE MACsec-256 port-level encryption for all fiber/copper uplink traffic
• TrustSec SGT tag end-to-end policy segmentation, Encrypted Traffic Analytics (ETA) for hidden threat detection
• Wire-speed hardware ACL filtering, CoPP control plane policing to protect supervisor CPU
• DHCP Snooping, DAI, IP Source Guard, IEEE 802.1X, MAB, WebAuth wired access authentication
• AAA authentication support via TACACS+/RADIUS/LDAP

QoS & Precision Timing

• 8 independent hardware priority queues per port, WRR/DRR congestion scheduling, per-port policing/marking/shaping
• IEEE 1588v2 PTP hardware timing for synchronized broadcast video, unified voice and industrial control networks

Automation, Programmability & Observability

• Model-driven open programmability: NETCONF, RESTCONF, YANG data models, gNMI, on-box Python scripting
• Real-time streaming telemetry, IPFIX flexible netflow export, continuous port latency and buffer utilization monitoring
• GOLD non-disruptive online diagnostic tests for chassis and module real-time health inspection
• Native seamless integration with Cisco DNA Center for zero-touch provisioning, unified policy management and full lifecycle automation

6. Typical Deployment Scenarios

1. Medium/Large Enterprise SD-Access Fabric Core
   Dual virtual paired C9606R-A pre-assembled chassis serve as the central redundant fabric border nodes; 10G/25G fiber uplinks connect downstream Catalyst 9400 distribution switches, supporting thousands of wired and Wi-Fi 6/6E wireless endpoints with pre-deployed HA supervisors for instant network activation.
2. Mid-Size Hybrid Data Center Spine Backbone
   40G/100G QSFP28 line cards connect leaf switches, storage arrays and multi-cloud gateway devices; hardware VRF multi-tenancy logically isolates enterprise, virtual server and cloud tenant workloads.
3. Ultra-High-Density Unified Wireless Aggregation Core
   25G SFP56 uplinks aggregate large fleets of multi-radio wireless controllers and APs; hardware QoS prioritizes low-latency voice, video and real-time collaboration traffic.
4. Industrial & Smart Multi-Building Campus Backbone
   Long-distance single-mode fiber trunking for distributed industrial IoT controllers, IP surveillance subnets and building automation gateways; MACsec hardware encryption secures critical control plane transport.
5. Education & Government Enterprise Core Network
   Factory pre-built redundant hardware meets strict public sector network uptime requirements; centralized security, power and fabric policy management via Cisco DNA Center, reducing on-site deployment labor time.

7. Standard Package Contents of C9606R-A Pre-Assembled SKU

• Pre-installed dual C9600X-SUP-2 Gen2 Silicon One supervisor engines
• Integrated N+1 hot-swappable fan tray
• Minimum 2× Platinum high-efficiency AC power supplies
  Integrated rack mounting hardware kit, front/rear cable management brackets
  Complete hardware installation guide, global safety, EMC, NEBS seismic and RoHS regulatory compliance documentation

Separately Sold Mandatory & Optional Accessories

1. Mandatory add-ons for full operation
   • Catalyst 9600 series fiber/copper line cards (SFP/SFP28/QSFP28/QSFP-DD or multigigabit PoE++ copper modules)
   • SFP/SFP28/QSFP28/QSFP-DD optical transceivers, breakout adapters and fiber patch cords
2. Optional upgrade hardware
   • Additional AC/DC/HVDC power supplies to expand to full N+N redundancy (total 4 PSU)
   • Supervisor SSD storage expansion modules
   • Spare replacement fan tray, spare power supply units
3. Software Licenses
   • DNA Advantage perpetual license required for full SD-Access EVPN, MACsec encryption, streaming telemetry and advanced automation features
   • DNA Essentials base license for fundamental Layer 2/Layer 3 switching and routing functionality

Short Commercial Catalog Summary for Quotation