Arista DCS-7280CR3-36S-F | 36-Port QSFP28 100G Switch Router

Arista DCS-7280CR3-36S-F — 36×QSFP28 Multi-Speed Switch Router with Front-to-Rear Airflow

Key Features at a Glance

• 36 × QSFP28/QSFP+ ports supporting flexible multi-speed operation: 1G, 10G, 25G, 40G, 50G, 100G, 200G, and 400G breakout modes for optimized port utilization
• 2.4 Tbps non-blocking switching capacity with 800 Mpps forwarding rate
• 3.8 µs store-and-forward latency with 4 GB packet buffer — eliminates head-of-line blocking
• Full Layer 3 switch router: BGP, OSPF, OSPFv3, IS-IS, MPLS (LDP, RSVP-TE, BGP-LU), SR-MPLS, SR-TE, EVPN, VXLAN, 512-way ECMP
• Over 2M IPv4 LPM routes, 1.4M+ IPv6 routes, 384K MAC addresses — exceptional routing scale for large networks
• Quad-core x86 CPU with 8 GB DRAM (64 GB optional) running Arista EOS
• IEEE 1588v2 PTP, SyncE, G.8275.1/2, G.8261/8264 for precision timing in synchronization-critical deployments
• Telemetry: LANZ, sFlow, Advanced Event Management (AEM), DANZ, Inband Network Telemetry (INT), IPFIX, streaming telemetry via gNMI
• CloudVision integration, Zero-Touch Provisioning (ZTP), Python/Bash scripting, eAPI, NETCONF, RESTCONF, OpenConfig
• Hot-swappable dual PSU (1+1) and 3-fan architecture (N+1); front-to-rear (-F) airflow
• 1RU form factor — compact design with flexible deployment options
• BrightStar Systems: Supplied fully tested, reset to factory defaults, and backed by a 1-year in-house warranty

2.4 Tbps Non-Blocking High-Throughput Architecture

3.8 µs Store-and-Forward Latency

Port Configuration and Multi-Speed Flexibility

• 36 × QSFP28/QSFP+: Support for 100GBASE-SR4, LR4, DR, FR, CWDM4, ZR/ZR+, and DAC/AOC cables. Flexible speed support: 1G, 10G, 25G, 40G, 50G, 100G, 200G native modes, and 400G breakout configurations for maximum port density optimization.
• Management: 1 × 100/1000 Mbps out-of-band management port + 1 × RS-232 RJ-45 console port, independent of the forwarding plane.
• Flexible port configurations: Operators can optimize port density based on topology requirements — native 36×100G, or breakout to 400G per-port or mixed-speed configurations for cost-effective deployment.

Layer 2 Switching Capabilities

• 802.1w/s Spanning Tree: RPVST+ for loop prevention and redundancy
• VLAN Support: 4096 VLANs with Q-in-Q capabilities for service provider deployments
• Link Aggregation: 802.3ad LACP with 256 ports per channel and 2048 groups for high-density bonding
• MLAG (Multi-Chassis LAG): Up to 512 ports per MLAG for flexible redundancy across multiple chassis
• Jumbo Frames: Support for frames up to 9216 bytes
• IGMP Snooping: IP multicast group filtering and management

Layer 3 Routing and Advanced Forwarding

• BGP Full-Table Routing: Over 2M IPv4 unicast LPM routes, 1.4M+ IPv6 routes in hardware FIB. Supports MP-BGP, BGP graceful restart, BGP FlowSpec, BMP, BGP-RPKI, and 512-way ECMP for sophisticated load balancing.
• Interior Gateway Protocols: OSPF, OSPFv3, IS-IS, RIPv2 with BFD and Micro BFD for sub-second convergence
• VRF and Policy: Virtual Routing and Forwarding (VRF), Policy-Based Routing (PBR), and Prefix Independent Convergence (PIC) for fast reroute
• VRRP and VARP: Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol and Virtual ARP for gateway redundancy
• Unicast RPF: Reverse path forwarding for source validation and anti-spoofing

MPLS and Segment Routing

• MPLS Label Switching: LDP, RSVP-TE with Fast Reroute (FRR), and BGP Labeled Unicast (BGP-LU) for seamless VPN and carrier services
• BGP-LS: BGP Link State for topology discovery and distribution in SDN controllers
• Segment Routing (SR): SR-MPLS and SR-TE (Segment Routing Traffic Engineering) for simplified, source-driven path optimization without per-path LSP state in the network core
• TI-LFA: Topology-Independent Loop-Free Alternate for sub-50ms local reroute protection

VPN and Overlay Services

• IP-VPN: BGP/MPLS IPv4 and IPv6 VPN (RFC 4364/4659) for carrier-grade multi-tenant service delivery
• VPLS: Virtual Private LAN Service for Layer 2 VPN connectivity
• EVPN-VXLAN: Ethernet VPN with VXLAN Tunnel Endpoints (VTEP) for multi-tenant data center overlays and MAC mobility
• EVPN-MPLS: Ethernet VPN over MPLS for carrier-grade Layer 2 services
• EVPN IRB (Integrated Routing and Bridging): Seamless Layer 2/3 virtualization for efficient multi-tenant and multi-domain networks

Precision Timing and Synchronization

• IEEE 1588v2 PTP: Hardware-assisted Precision Time Protocol for network clock synchronization, supporting Boundary Clock and Transparent Clock modes
• Synchronous Ethernet (SyncE): G.8261, G.8262 for frequency synchronization over Ethernet
• Telecom Timing Standards: G.8275.1 and G.8275.2 for phase/time synchronization in telecom and financial networks
• G.8264: MPLS Section and Span Loss of Signal monitoring for timing chain integrity

Quality of Service (QoS)

• 8 queues per port with strict priority, weighted round-robin (WRR), and weighted fair queueing (WFQ)
• Classification: DSCP and 802.1p tag-based priority mapping with remarking support
• ECN (Explicit Congestion Notification): DCTCP-friendly congestion signaling for reduced packet loss in oversubscribed networks
• PFC (Priority Flow Control) and DCBX: Data Center Bridging Exchange for lossless Ethernet and converged traffic
• Hierarchical QoS (H-QoS): Multi-level queue structures for complex traffic policies and SLA guarantees
• Egress shaping and policing per-interface and per-queue

Security

• Control Plane Policing (CPP): Rate-limiting of CPU-destined traffic to protect routing stability
• ACLs and User-Defined Fields (UDF): Ingress/egress access control lists at L2, L3, and L4 with 100K+ Algorithmic ACL entries for sophisticated packet filtering and rate limiting
• TACACS+ and RADIUS: Centralized authentication and accounting for administrative access
• Secure Boot: Cryptographic verification of bootloader and EOS image integrity
• Layer 2 Security: DHCP Relay/Snooping and ARP trapping for Layer 2 security enforcement (Note: MACsec is not supported on CR3-36S)

Telemetry, Monitoring, and Analytics

• LANZ (Latency Analyzer): Per-port, real-time microburst detection and queue depth monitoring at microsecond granularity. Records egress port, queue, drop reason, and timestamp for every congestion event.
• Accelerated sFlow v5: Industry-standard traffic sampling for flow analysis and capacity planning. Integrates with third-party collectors (Kentik, Splunk, Solarwinds).
• Advanced Event Management (AEM): Programmable event-driven automation within EOS — customize alerts and actions, automate routine tasks, and respond to real-time network conditions.
• DANZ: Advanced mirroring and traffic analysis with configurable M:N aggregation and L2/3/4 filtering for deep packet inspection.
• Inband Network Telemetry (INT): Embedded telemetry in packet headers for hop-by-hop analytics and performance visibility
• IPFIX: IP Flow Information Export for NetFlow-compatible analytics
• Streaming Telemetry: Real-time counter and state export via gNMI (gRPC) and Arista eAPI (REST). Supports OpenConfig data models for vendor-neutral management.

EOS Automation and Provisioning

• CloudVision: Centralized configuration management, network-wide change control, topology visualization, and compliance monitoring across multi-site Arista deployments.
• Zero-Touch Provisioning (ZTP): Automatic configuration download on first power-up via DHCP — no manual CLI access required for initial deployment.
• Python and Bash: Native on-box scripting with full Linux shell access for custom event handlers and automation workflows.
• eAPI and RESTCONF: RESTful and NETCONF programmatic interfaces to all configuration and operational commands. Integrates with Ansible, Terraform, and custom orchestration.
• OpenConfig and gNMI: Vendor-neutral data models and high-performance streaming RPC for configuration and telemetry.

Physical Specifications and Airflow

• Form Factor: 1RU — compact design for flexible deployment
• Power Supply: Dual hot-swappable PSU (1+1) redundancy for high availability
• Cooling: 3-fan architecture with N+1 redundancy and hot-swappable fan trays
• Storage: 4 GB Flash, optional SSD, 2 × USB ports
• Compliance: FCC Class A, CE, RoHS, WEEE

Scalability and Table Sizes

• MAC Addresses: 384K
• IPv4 Unicast LPM Routes: Over 2M
• IPv6 Unicast LPM Routes: 1.4M+ (FlexRoute)
• Algorithmic ACL Entries: 100K+
• ECMP: 512-way

Lifecycle and Reliability

• Self-Healing Software: EOS includes Stateful Fault Repair (SFR) for automatic recovery from software faults without data plane impact, and Stateful Fault Containment (SFC) for fault isolation.
• In-Service Software Updates: Dual-partition boot with Smart System Upgrade (SSU) and Accelerated Software Update (ASU) for planned upgrades with minimal disruption.
• Configuration Rollback: Instant rollback to previous configuration snapshots via EOS configuration replace.
• BrightStar Systems 1-Year Warranty: Supplied fully tested, reset to factory defaults, and backed by a 1-year in-house warranty.

Similar Arista Models to Consider

• DCS-7280CR3K-32P4-F: 32×QSFP28 + 4×OSFP with 4.8 Tbps third-generation K-series for ultra-high-density spine/core deployments.
• DCS-7280CR3K-96-F: 96×QSFP28 with 9.6 Tbps K-series capacity for maximum port density in cloud-scale deployments.
• DCS-7280SR3-40YC6-F: 40×25G + 6×100G with 800 Gbps for access-tier deployments with mixed-speed requirements.

Related 7280 Series Resources

Summary

• 1-Year BrightStar warranty for end user customers
• 90-Day BrightStar Warranty for resellers

• Free FedEx Ground shipping within the United States
• FedEx Overnight shipping available as well
• FedEx International Shipping available for customers outside of the United States