Thanks for the reply Daniel.

I've got "service unsupported-transceiver" already turned on.

This command is used for incompatible SFP's by just suppressing the incompatible log message that the console displays. The unsupported SFP's still work regardless whether this option is enabled.

I'm running the latest 6.2.1.6, A07 firmware released 30 May 2015.

The SFP you recommended is an LX (ie. dual-core) transceiver.

All our Cisco compatible dual-core SFP's work fine.

We're having an issue with the single-core/BX SFP's and looking for an alternative Dell compatible one.

Kind regards,

   Ryan

Thanks again Daniel,

That's really unfortunate as our customers who are splitting their dual core cross-connect between two switches will now need to purchase an additional x-connect to achieve the same thing.

Do you know if Dell will provide support for BX SFP's in the future ?

Kind regards,

   Ryan

You could use a copper transceiver in one of the ports on the N4046F, the use something like the Allied telesis AT-GS2002 media converter with a bidi SFP , AT do support BiDi, AT-SPBD10-13; I'm sure there are other media converters that would offer similar support.

Hi Cerbera,

Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately it's not really an option to install about 12 of those boxes for each of our customers using the single-core BX SFP's in our data centre rack.

It's really strange that a lot of other manufacturers support the BX SFP's but not a large reputable brand such as Dell.

Hey guys, is there any way this can be pushed to the software/firmware development team to have a look at ?

I believe this would be a very minor change that would need to be made.

According to the Specification for Diagnostic Monitoring Interface for Optical Transceivers, Rev 12.2 November 21, 2014

Under the Ethernet Compliance Codes (page 19) - it looks like Dell could be honoring only the first 4 bits (0-3), which include:

1000BASE-T

1000BASE-CX

1000BASE-LX *3

1000BASE-SX

Later this was revised to use bits 8 bits (0-7), which also include:

100BASE-LX/LX10

100BASE-FX

BASE-BX10 *3

BASE-PX *3

*3 Ethernet LX, PX and BX compliance codes require the use of the Bit Rate, Nominal value (byte 12), link length values for single mode and two types of multimode fiber (Bytes 14-17) and wavelength value for the laser (Bytes 60 & 61).

Thank you,

    Ryan

Hi Daniel,

Thanks for the input - I've done some further investigation and I see that this SFP is compatible in Firmware version 6.1.2.4,A05 (14 Nov 20143:00:30 PM) and prior.

It seemed to break from version 6.2.0.5,A06 (10 Mar 20159:33:31 PM) onwards.

I got the idea when looking at this ticket:

8132F optical SFP not recognised after firmware upgrade (en.community.dell.com/.../19638515) who was experiencing the same error message.

Would this be considered a bug introduced in the latest 6.2 version of the firmware ?

Is it possible for this to be brought forward to the software engineering team who look after the firmware ?

Kind regards,

   Ryan