46 Fabric OS Administrator’s Guide
53-1001763-02
Blade terminology and compatibility
3

CP blades

The control processor (CP) blade provides redundancy and acts as the brains of the
enterprise-class platform. The Brocade 48000 supports the CP256 blade. The Brocade DCX and
DCX-4S support the CP8 blades.
The CP blades in the Brocade DCX and DCX-4S are hot-swappable. When the CPs from a Brocade
DCX are inserted into a Brocade DCX-4S, the switch type changes. The same is true when inserting
a CP blade from a Brocade DCX-4S into a Brocade DCX. When a CP blade with a Fabric OS prior to
v6.2.0 is inserted into a Brocade DCX-4S, the blade becomes faulty. You can correct this issue by
upgrading the firmware on the CP blade in a Brocade DCX or DCX-4S chassis.
Mixed CP blades are not supported on a single chassis, except during specific upgrade procedures
detailed in the Brocade 48000 Hardware Reference Manual. CP4 and CP8 blades cannot be
mixed in the same chassis under any circumstances. Brocade recommends that each Brocade
platform have only one type of CP blade installed and that each CP (primary and secondary
partition) maintains the same firmware version.
For more information on maintaining firmware in your enterprise-class platform, refer to Chapter 9,
“Installing and Maintaining Firmware”.

Core blades

Core blades provide intra-chassis switching and ICL connectivity between DCX platforms. The
Brocade DCX supports two CORE8 core blades. The Brocade DCX-4S supports two CR4S-8 core
blades. This blade is not interchangeable or hot-swappable with the Brocade DCX core blades. If
you try to interchange the blades they become faulty.
The Brocade 48000 does not support core blades.

Port and application blade compatibility

Table 5 identifies which port and application blades are supported for each Brocade platform.
TABLE 5 Port blades supported by each platform
Port blades Brocade 48000 (CP4) Brocade DCX and DCX-4S
FA4-18 Supported Supported
FC10-6 Supported Supported
FC4-16 Supported Unsupported
FC4-16IP Supported Unsupported
FC4-32 Supported Unsupported
FC4-48 Supported Unsupported
FC8-16 Supported Supported
FC8-32 Supported Supported
FC8-48 Supported Supported
FC8-64 Unsupported Supported
FCOE10-241Unsupported Supported
FR4-18i Supported Supported