Nexus 7000 RISE Improves Network Integration for Cisco Prime NAM

Last week was a busy week in Las Vegas at another eventful Interop. In addition to our new announcements around ACI, we’ve been busy showing off our new Remote Integrated Services Engine (RISE) capability we introduced for the Nexus 7000 Series switch. Our introductory series on RISE concludes with a look at how RISE facilitates network integration of Cisco Prime Network Analysis Module (NAM) through the Nexus 7000.

Following our initial blog announcement last week, Andrew Lerner at Gartner took time from a busy Interop week to provide a nice blog on the RISE integration with Citrix NetScaler as well, which I encourage you to read here.

If you recall from my earlier posts here and here, RISE is the new protocol in the Nexus 7000 and 7000 Series switch that allows integration of a remote service appliance like NAM or an application delivery controller with the same functional capability as if it was attached to the switch backplane like an embedded services blade. Devices can actually be connected over any layer 2 network, and not necessarily directly connected to the Nexus switch ports, although that is the usual configuration. RISE-enabled ports are configured on the Nexus 7000 and up to 4 dedicated ports per appliance can be configured for maximum throughput to connected devices.

It’s a great benefit for appliance vendors to not have to develop specific network-embedded modules of their products to install inside the chassis, as well as saving valuable slots while providing the same degree of traffic visibility and optimization for the appliance. In this video, I had a chance to sit down with Praveen Chandra, Director of NAM Engineering at Cisco, to talk about the first Cisco service appliance to support RISE and what it means for Prime NAM customers: