Monitor Cisco switch stack

You can view the health of individual Cisco^® switch stack members, monitor power and data connections between the members, and quickly locate a switch with issues.

Out-of-the-box events and alerts notify you when a member, or a connection between members goes down.

Add the Cisco switch stack for monitoring as a node. The IP address is always assigned to the master switch (highlighted with a crown icon).

View stack members and rings

When you receive an alert about a switch stack problem, go to the node details page, and click the switch stack subview.

The subview provides member-specific monitoring with topology maps showing how the data ports and power ports are connected, and information to pinpoint switches with issues.

You can quickly see which switch is having issues, locate it by serial number in the stack, and replace it or resolve the issue.

View the health of stack members

When you are monitoring hardware health on a Cisco switch stack node, you can see the health of individual switches in the stack. The health indicators inform you when the values on a switch are near the safe limits, or when they reach the critical stage.

Log in to the SolarWinds Platform Web Console, and go to the switch stack node details page, and click the Network subview.
Consult the Current Hardware Health resource.
Expand a switch in the stack to display hardware health monitors.

The item in the Status column describes the number of sensors monitored on the switch, grouped by the status of the sensor.

You can now troubleshoot the switch stack member that is experiencing issues.

Cisco switch stack events

Events for Cisco switch stacks include messages about the following issues and changes:

Stack ring redundancy loss
Stack ring failure
Members being added or removed
Member number changes
Master switch changes
Power redundancy loss
Power capacity change

Out-of-the-box alerts for switch stacks

Out-of-the-box switch stack alerts inform you about the following items and more:

Switch Stack Master Changed
Switch Stack Data Ring Broken
Switch Stack Member Number Changed
Switch Stack Power Redundancy Lost

Not all out-of-the-box alerts are turned on by default.

Create alerts based on switch stack events

You can configure additional notifications based on switch stack events. For example, you can specify that when a stack ring fails, you want to receive an email with details.

Out-of-the-box alerts cover the most frequent issues. Review available alerts and duplicate and edit the alerts if you only need small adjustments.

Select Alerts & Activity > Alerts, and click Manage Alerts.
Click Add New Alert.
On Trigger Condition, select the SwitchStack item you want to alert on.
In Trigger alert when, select a condition, click the arrow in the second box next to the selected SwitchStack object, and select Browse all events.
Select the event you want to alert on and if necessary, complete the trigger condition.

For example, if you want to be notified about a switch stack ring failure, select the Ring Failure event, select Event must match the filter, and then select New Ring Failure is equal to Yes.
Specify the trigger action and complete the wizard.