Arista unqualified SFP

Thu Aug 18 11:47:00 UTC 2016

Same here, i was considering Arista, because they are quite cost 
effective,feature rich, interesting hardware for developing some custom 
solutions. But no more, after reading about unreasonable vendor lock-in.
But such inflexibility are very bad sign, this "openness" looks like 
marketing only, under the hood it seems worse than other solutions on 
market. Also when support shows such inflexibility, it is very bad sign. 
And very sad.

On 2016-08-18 14:29, Dovid Bender wrote:
> And I was about to jump on to the Arista train.....
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Dovid
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Stanislaw <me at nek0.net>
> Sender: "NANOG" <nanog-bounces at nanog.org>Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2016 
> 13:24:05
> To: nanog list<nanog at nanog.org>
> Subject: Re: Arista unqualified SFP
> 
> Hi all,
> If somebody is following my epic adventure of getting uqualified SFP to
> work on Aristas, here is the unhappy end of it.
> 
> I've written to Arista support and got the following dialogue:
> Support guy:
> Hi,
> Thank you for contacting Arista Support. My name is **** and I'll be
> assisting you on this case.
> Could you please provide the "show version" output from this switch?
> 
> Me:
> Hi,
> Here it is:
> <show version output here>
> 
> Support guy:
> Hi,
> Thank you for the information.
> Unfortunately, we are unable to activate your 3rd party components. To
> ensure ongoing quality, Arista devices are designed to support only
> properly qualified transceivers.
> Please let me know if you have any other questions.
> 
> Me:
> I do not understand,
> But there is a command which allows using non-Arista transceivers. Why
> have you implemented it but don't provide an access key to your
> customers when they ask for it?
> If it is required to sign some papers which declare that I am aware of
> all the risks and losing my warranty - I agree with that, lets do it.
> Any way what are the conditions to receive that access key?
> 
> Support guy:
> I'm afraid that there is nothing I'm able to do regarding this
> situation. If you have any other questions regarding enabling 3rd party
> options in Arista switches, I suggest to contact your local account 
> team
> (or sales) for further discussion on this matter.
> 
> 
> Next, i've tried inserting various QSFP+ DAC cables I have - none of
> them has been even detected on the switch, it was acting like nothing
> has been inserted. I guess that even if I get the key, most of my
> transceivers/DAC (which work like a champ in Juniper or Extreme
> switches) cables wouldnt work.
> 
> I'm writing this post to make somebody who considers buying their
> switches be aware of what they'd get. Just buy Juniper instead.
> 
> 
> Stanislaw wrote at 2016-08-17 23:25:
>> Hi Tim,
>> 
>> Thanks for your expressive answer. Will try it :)
>> 
>> Tim Jackson писал 2016-08-17 22:57:
>> 
>>> I'd suggest bitching and moaning at your account team & support until
>>> they give you the key to unlock them..
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Tim
>>> 
>>> On Wed, Aug 17, 2016 at 2:50 PM, Stanislaw <me at nek0.net> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> Hi all,
>>>> Is there a way for unlocking off-brand transceivers usage on Arista
>>>> switches?
>>>> 
>>>> I've got an Arista 7050QX switch with 4.14 EOS version. Then it has
>>>> been found out that Arista switches seem to not have possibility to
>>>> unlock off-brand xcievers usage (by some service command or so).
>>>> 
>>>> I've patched /usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages/XcvrAgent.py, made the
>>>> checking function bypass the actual check and it helped: ports are
>>>> not in errdisable state anymore. But despite of xceivers are 
>>>> detected
>>>> correctly, links aren't coming up (they are in notconnect state).
>>>> 
>>>> If anyone possibly have does have a sacred knowledge of bringing
>>>> off-branded transceivers to life on Arista switches, your help'd be
>>>> very appreciated. Thanks.