Cisco® Catalyst® 4500 Series Switches enable borderless unified wired and wireless networks, providing high-performance, mobile, and secure user experiences through Layer 2-4 switching. Enabling security, mobility, application performance, video, and energy savings over your network infrastructure, the Cisco Catalyst 4500 Switch supports resiliency, virtualization, and automation, further improving the ease of network use. Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series Switches provide borderless performance, scalability, and services with reduced total cost of ownership (TCO) and superior investment protection.

The Cisco Catalyst 4500 Switch delivers predictable and scalable high performance, with advanced dynamic quality of service (QoS) capabilities and configuration flexibility for deploying borderless networks. Integrated resiliency features in both hardware and software maximize network availability, helping to ensure workforce productivity, profitability, and customer success. Its centralized, innovative, and flexible system design helps ensure smooth migration to wire-speed IPv6 and 10 Gigabit Ethernet (GE). The forward and backward compatibility between generations of the Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series extends deployment life, providing exceptional investment protection, while reducing the (TCO).

The Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series is a high-performance, next-generation extension to the Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series. The new E-Series is composed of the Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series supervisor engines, E-Series line cards, and E-Series chassis, which are designed for a high-performance, mobile, and secure user experience with superior backward and forward compatibility, delivering exceptional investment protection for organizations of all sizes.

Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series and Classic Line Cards

The Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series offers two classes of line cards: classic and E-Series. Classic line cards provide 6 gigabits of switching capacity per slot. E-Series line cards provide increased switching capacity per slot. This increase in per-slot switching capacity with the E-Series line cards requires the Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series chassis and the Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series Supervisor. Two types of E-Series line cards are available based on the per-slot switching capacity. E-Series line cards numbered 47xx operate at 48 gigabits per slot, while E-Series line cards numbered 46xx operate at 24 gigabits per slot. Classic line cards may be deployed in both classic and E‑Series chassis with either classic Cisco Catalyst 4500 Series supervisor engines or with the Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series Supervisor Engine. With the E-Series supervisor engine, the per-slot switching capacity for classic line cards remains at 6 gigabits per slot. However, because of the centralized switching architecture of the Cisco Catalyst 4500, the classic line cards will adopt all of the new E-Series supervisor engine features such as eight queues per port, dynamic QoS, and hardware-based IPv6 routing. For more feature details, refer to the E-Series supervisor engine data sheet. Classic line cards and E-Series line cards may be mixed and matched within a Cisco Catalyst 4500E Series chassis with no performance degradation: classic line cards will operate at 6 gigabits per slot, and E-Series line cards operate at either 48 gigabits per slot or 24 gigabits per slot based on whether they belong to the 47xx or 46xx family of line cards. Table 1 summarizes the chassis and supervisor support for both classic and E-Series line cards.

- 24-port line-rate SFP line card, providing 24 gigabits per-slot capacity (1:1 oversubscribed)
- Cisco IOS Software Release 12.2(44)SG or later
- L2-4 Jumbo Frame support (up to 9216 bytes)
- Inherits Supervisor Engine QoS capability
- Compatible only with E-Series supervisor engines
- Enterprise, mid-market, and commercial core and distribution deployments requiring line-rate capability
- Service provider: GE aggregation for DSLAM/PON/mobile data backhaul