Cisco Switch Catalyst 6800

About the Cisco Catalyst 6800 Series

The Cisco Catalyst 6800 Series is a modular campus core switch family. It is the class of switch that sits at the centre of a large building or campus network, aggregating dozens of access switches and providing the routing between them. As with any modular platform, what you buy is a chassis plus the cards that go into it — the chassis on its own is a metal shell with slots, power bays and a backplane.

Two chassis families appear on this page, and they are built on different principles:

• C6807-XL — a seven-slot chassis, expandable. The slots accept supervisor engines and line cards, so the switch grows by adding cards rather than by being replaced. The chassis is rated for a very high backplane capacity, which is what makes it a core platform rather than a large access switch.
• C6880-X — a fixed five-rack-unit chassis whose supervisor is integrated rather than supplied as a separate card. It is the compact option for a smaller core or a distribution layer that needs core-grade forwarding in less rack space.

The part numbers on this page use a small set of conventions worth learning before comparing prices:

• C6800-<ports><medium> — a line card. TX denotes copper (10GBASE-T style) ports, SFP denotes fibre cages. The port count comes first.
• -XL — the enhanced line card variant, carrying the larger forwarding engine. Not interchangeable with the non-XL card of the same port count.
• SUP — supervisor engine. The control card of a 6807-XL chassis.
• -BUN — bundle. A chassis order that already includes the supervisor, power supplies and fan tray, so the switch arrives closer to a runnable state.
• C1- — a Cisco ONE part number, meaning the product is sold under Cisco's subscription software entitlement model rather than as a perpetual licence.
• WS-F6K-DFC4 — a Distributed Forwarding Card. These are the daughter cards that mount on a line card to give it local forwarding, and both the standard and the enhanced (EXL) versions are listed here.

How to Choose a Catalyst 6800

1. A chassis is not a working switch — budget for the whole assembly

This is the single most common mistake when pricing a modular core. The bare C6807-XL chassis is the least expensive large item in this catalogue, and correctly so: it contains slots and nothing else. To make it carry traffic you need, at minimum:

• a supervisor engine (C6800-SUP6T) — one for a non-redundant design, two for the redundancy a core switch is normally specified with;
• line cards for the ports you need, in the media your cabling uses;
• power supplies and a fan tray.

The -BUN bundles exist precisely to reduce this assembly problem — a C6807-XL-S2T-BUN arrives with the supervisor, power and fan tray included, so compare a bundle against a bare chassis plus its separately purchased parts rather than against the chassis line alone.

2. Choose the media before the port count

Line cards come in copper and fibre versions with equivalent port counts and very different prices, because the physical layer is different hardware:

• Copper (TX) cards — 48-port copper line cards. They are the cheaper option per port, but copper 10G is limited to short runs of a few tens of metres, which constrains where in the building the chassis can live.
• Fibre (SFP) cards — 48-port cage line cards. They cost more because each port needs a transceiver on top, but they support the long runs a campus core actually needs. Budget for the optics separately: the cage does nothing without a transceiver in it.

Where the core connects to another building or to a service provider, the 8-port 10 Gigabit and 8-port 40 Gigabit cards are the uplink cards. The 40G card is priced far above the 10G card for the same port count — a reminder to confirm the uplink speed requirement with the network design before ordering, rather than buying 40G "for headroom".

3. Match the line card generation to the supervisor

The -XL line cards carry a larger forwarding engine than the plain cards of the same port count, and the price step is significant — a 48-port SFP line card in its XL form costs several times the standard card. The XL cards exist to be driven by a supervisor and a fabric that can keep up with them. Buy XL cards only where the chassis, the supervisor and the traffic actually require that forwarding scale; the card will still slot in otherwise, but the premium buys nothing.

4. Read the DFC cards as components, not as options

The WS-F6K-DFC4-EXL and its standard counterpart are Distributed Forwarding Cards that attach to a line card to give it local forwarding capacity. They are not standalone line cards and cannot be used without one. If your design calls for distributed forwarding, the DFC is part of the line-card cost, not an alternative to it.

5. Check which entitlement model you are buying

The parts prefixed C1- on this page — including several chassis and one bundled system — are Cisco ONE SKUs. Cisco ONE is a software subscription entitlement rather than a perpetual licence. The hardware is the same; what changes is how the purchase is accounted for, renewed and capitalised. If your procurement rules require a perpetual licence, say so before ordering and we will quote the equivalent conventional part number.

Catalyst 6807-XL Chassis (7-slot, expandable)

Compare these carefully. The bundle carries a supervisor engine, two power supplies and the fan tray; the bare chassis carries none of them. Buying the bundle instead of the chassis is usually cheaper than buying the chassis and its parts separately — but only if the supervisor in the bundle is the one your design requires. The Sup2T and Sup6T bundles are not the same switch.

Catalyst 6880-X Chassis (5RU, integrated supervisor)

Note the two lines that say no power or fan: those chassis arrive as bare frames. The models with a line card already fitted (the two 16P10G entries) are the ones to compare against a bare chassis plus a separate card. Also note the engine tier: Super 2T and Super 2TXL are different supervisors, and the XL variant is the larger one — which is why C6880-X is priced above C6880-X-LE.

Catalyst 6800 Line Cards

Read the two 48-port fibre lines side by side. The plain SFP+ card and the XL card present the same ports and the same medium, but the XL card is nearly three times the price because of its forwarding engine. Whether that premium is justified depends entirely on the traffic the card will carry and on the supervisor driving the chassis — not on the port count.

Supervisor Engines and Forwarding Cards

The supervisor is the card that decides how much the rest of the chassis can do. A 6807-XL chassis needs at least one C6800-SUP6T. A redundant core design needs two — and note that the bundle chassis listed earlier each ship with a specific supervisor generation, so if your design calls for SUP6T, make sure the bundle you order is the one that contains it.

Catalyst 6800 Cisco ONE Chassis

These are the same chassis platforms supplied under Cisco's subscription entitlement model. Presented together here so the entitlement difference can be priced directly rather than discovered at quotation.

Prices are our current selling prices in US dollars, excluding shipping. Click a model number for the full specification table and availability.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the C6807-XL chassis include a supervisor?

No. The bare C6807-XL is the chassis only and needs a supervisor engine, line cards, power supplies and a fan tray before it will forward traffic. If you want the supervisor and power included, order one of the bundle (-BUN) part numbers and check which supervisor generation that particular bundle carries.

What is the difference between the C6807-XL and the C6880-X?

The C6807-XL is a seven-slot chassis that expands by adding cards, with the supervisor supplied as a separate card. The C6880-X is a fixed five-rack-unit chassis with its supervisor integrated. The 6807-XL is the expandable choice for a growing core; the 6880-X puts core-grade forwarding into less rack space.

What does the -XL suffix mean on a line card?

It denotes the enhanced line card variant, carrying a larger forwarding engine than the plain card of the same port count. On the 48-port fibre cards the price difference is roughly three to one. The XL cards make sense where the chassis and the traffic actually require that forwarding scale — not as a default upgrade.

What does the C1- prefix on a part number mean?

It identifies a Cisco ONE SKU: the same hardware supplied under Cisco's subscription software entitlement model rather than with a perpetual licence. It changes how the purchase is accounted for and renewed, not how the switch performs. If you require a perpetual licence, ask for the conventional part number instead.

Do the C6880-X chassis come with power supplies and fans?

Not all of them. The plain C6880-X and C6880-X-LE entries are chassis without power supplies or fan tray. Add those to the budget, or choose a configuration that already includes a line card and confirm what else is required.

What are the WS-F6K-DFC4 cards for?

They are Distributed Forwarding Cards that attach to a line card to give it local forwarding capacity. They are components that mount on a line card, not standalone line cards, so a DFC cannot serve as a port card on its own — it is part of the line-card bill, not an alternative to it.

Do I need to buy the SFP modules separately for the fibre line cards?

Yes. The SFP+ cages on the fibre line cards are empty and require transceivers plus the matching fibre patch cords. That applies at every port count, so on a 48-port SFP card the optics are a significant part of the total cost. Send us the link plan and we will quote the modules with the card.

Can I mix different line cards in the same chassis?

Yes — a modular chassis exists precisely so that copper, fibre, 10G and 40G cards can be combined in one switch, in the slots appropriate to the design. Distribute the load so that no one card or supervisor becomes the choke point, and remember that a redundant core design normally calls for two supervisors rather than one.