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12-5
Cisco MDS 9000 Family Fabric Manager Configuration Guide
OL-17256-03, Cisco MDS NX-OS Release 4.x
Chapter 12 Initial Configuration
NTP Configuration
Tip If an active server fails, a configured peer helps in providing the NTP time. Provide a direct NTP server
association and configure a peer to ensure backup support if the active server fails.
If you only configure a peer, the most accurate peer takes on the role of the NTP server and the other
peer(s) acts as a peer(s). Both machines end at the right time if they have the right time source or if they
point to the right NTP source.
NTP Configuration Guidelines
The following guidelines apply to all NTP configurations:
• You should have a peer association with another switch only when you are sure that your clock is
reliable (which means that you are a client of a reliable NTP server).
• A peer configured alone takes on the role of a server and should be used as backup. If you have two
servers, then you can have several switches point to one server, and the remaining switches to the
other server. Then you would configure peer association between these two sets. This forces the
clock to be more reliable.
• If you only have one server, all of the switches should have a client association with that server.
Not even a server down time will affect well-configured switches in the network. Figure 12-4 displays a
network with two NTP stratum 2 servers and two switches.
Figure 12-4 NTP Peer and Server Association
In this configuration, the switches were configured as follows:
• Stratum 2 Server 1
–
IPv4 address–10.10.10.10
• Stratum–2 Server-2
–
IPv4 address–10.10.10.9
• Switch 1 IPv4 address–10.10.10.1
• Switch 1 NTP configuration
–
NTP server 10.10.10.10
85532
From lower stratum
server-1
From lower stratum
server-2
Peer association
Peer association
Server
association
Server
association
Stratum-2
Server-2
Stratum-2
Server-1
Switch-1 Switch-2
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