Cisco VS-S2T-10G-XL
Cat 6500 Sup 2T with 2x10GbE and 3 x 1GbE with MSFC5 PFC4XL
Product Highlights
What's Included
1GB Flash (1x MEM-C6K-CPTFL1GB)
As enterprise and data center networks scale, the supervisor engine at the heart of your chassis must keep pace — delivering wire-rate forwarding, deep routing tables, and advanced services without compromise. The Cisco VS-S2T-10G-XL is the Supervisor Engine 2T XL for the Catalyst 6500 Series, purpose-built to meet those demands.
Integrating a 2-Terabit crossbar switch fabric with 80 Gbps switching capacity per slot, the VS-S2T-10G-XL provides the performance headroom needed for high-density 10 Gigabit Ethernet deployments across campus core, data center aggregation, and service provider edge networks. The XL designation signifies the factory-installed PFC4XL (Policy Feature Card 4XL), which delivers significantly expanded forwarding table capacity — up to 1,024,000 IPv4 routes, 512,000 IPv6 routes, and 1,024,000 NetFlow entries — compared to the standard PFC4 variant.
With the onboard MSFC5 (Multilayer Switch Feature Card 5), the VS-S2T-10G-XL supports advanced Layer 2 and Layer 3 services including MPLS VPNs, VPLS, IPv6, hardware-accelerated QoS, ACLs, and NAT. Cisco Virtual Switching System (VSS) technology enables two physical chassis to operate as a single logical switch, doubling aggregate bandwidth to 4 Tbps while simplifying management and improving resiliency. This supervisor engine ships with 2x 10GbE and 3x 1GbE uplink ports, 2 GB DRAM, and 1 GB Compact Flash — ready for immediate deployment in Catalyst 6500 E-Series chassis.
Features & Benefits
2-Terabit Switching Fabric
The VS-S2T-10G-XL integrates a high-performance 2 Tbps crossbar switch fabric delivering 80 Gbps per slot on every slot of the Catalyst 6500 E-Series chassis. This ensures non-blocking, wire-rate performance even in fully populated chassis configurations, eliminating forwarding bottlenecks in high-traffic environments.
PFC4XL Extended Forwarding Tables
The factory-installed PFC4XL policy feature card provides dramatically expanded hardware forwarding tables — supporting up to 1,024,000 IPv4 routes, 512,000 IPv6 routes, 128,000 MAC addresses, and 1,024,000 NetFlow entries. This makes the XL variant ideal for networks with large routing tables, extensive NetFlow monitoring, or complex multi-tenant environments.
Advanced Services in Hardware
Hardware-accelerated QoS, ACLs, NAT, MPLS, and VPLS are processed at line rate by the forwarding engine, ensuring that enabling advanced services does not degrade throughput. The MSFC5 daughter card provides the Layer 2/3 intelligence needed for complex campus and WAN deployments.
Virtual Switching System (VSS)
VSS technology allows two Catalyst 6500 chassis to be combined into a single logical switch, scaling aggregate bandwidth to 4 Tbps while simplifying network topology, eliminating Spanning Tree loops, and enabling Stateful Switchover (SSO) for high availability. This reduces operational complexity and improves uptime for mission-critical networks.
Comprehensive Security
Built-in Cisco TrustSec with MACsec encryption, role-based access control lists, and Control Plane Policing protect the network from unauthorized access and denial-of-service attacks. These security features are enforced in hardware, ensuring protection without performance penalties.
High-Availability & Resiliency
Redundant supervisor engine support with Stateful Switchover (SSO) and In-Service Software Upgrade (ISSU) capabilities enables zero-downtime maintenance and software updates. Nonstop forwarding ensures uninterrupted traffic flow during supervisor failover events.
Deployment Scenarios
Enterprise Campus Core / Distribution
Deploy the VS-S2T-10G-XL in a Catalyst 6509-E or 6513-E chassis at the campus core or distribution layer to aggregate high-speed uplinks from access-layer switches. The 80 Gbps per-slot capacity and extended routing tables handle large-scale campus networks with thousands of endpoints and complex routing policies.
Data Center Aggregation
Use the Supervisor 2T XL to aggregate 10GbE server farm connections in a data center environment. The PFC4XL's expanded NetFlow table supports granular traffic visibility, while hardware-accelerated QoS ensures latency-sensitive applications receive priority treatment.
Service Provider Edge / PE Router
Leverage hardware MPLS and VPLS support to deploy the Catalyst 6500 as a provider edge router. The 1M+ IPv4 route capacity accommodates full Internet routing tables, and VSS provides the redundancy service providers require for carrier-grade availability.
Redundant Supervisor Upgrade
Install the VS-S2T-10G-XL as a secondary supervisor in an existing Catalyst 6500 E-Series chassis running a Supervisor 2T to enable SSO redundancy and ISSU capabilities, minimizing planned downtime and protecting against hardware failures.
General
Performance
Forwarding Table Capacity (PFC4XL)
Interfaces
Sub-Modules
Memory
Features
Physical
Compatibility Notes
Compatible Chassis (E-Series Only)
- Cisco Catalyst 6503-E
- Cisco Catalyst 6504-E
- Cisco Catalyst 6506-E
- Cisco Catalyst 6509-E
- Cisco Catalyst 6509-V-E
- Cisco Catalyst 6513-E
- Cisco Catalyst 6807-XL
Uplink Interfaces
- 2x 10GbE ports (X2 transceiver slots — X2 modules sold separately)
- 3x 1GbE ports (SFP transceiver slots — SFP modules sold separately)
Sub-Modules (Factory Installed)
- MSFC5 (VS-F6K-MSFC5) — Multilayer Switch Feature Card
- PFC4XL (VS-F6K-PFC4XL) — Policy Feature Card 4 XL
Included Memory
- 2 GB DRAM (MEM-SUP2T-2GB)
- 1 GB Compact Flash (MEM-C6K-CPTFL1GB)
Note: X2 and SFP transceiver modules shown in product images are typically not included and must be ordered separately.
Downloads & Resources
Frequently Asked Questions
| Part Number | Product | Key Difference |
|---|---|---|
| VS-S2T-10G | Supervisor Engine 2T (Standard) | Ships with PFC4 (standard) instead of PFC4XL — smaller forwarding tables (256K IPv4 / 128K IPv6 vs. 1M / 512K) |
| VS-S2T-10G-XL= | Supervisor Engine 2T XL (Spare) | Identical hardware to VS-S2T-10G-XL but sold as a spare part (= suffix) — not bundled with a chassis |
| VS-F6K-PFC4XL= | PFC4XL Upgrade Kit | Field-upgrade card to convert an existing VS-S2T-10G (PFC4) to XL-level forwarding table capacity |
| VS-S720-10G-3CXL | Supervisor Engine 720-10GE XL | Previous-generation supervisor with 720 Gbps fabric — significantly lower per-slot bandwidth than the 2T's 80 Gbps |