Cisco/Meraki switch SFP compatibility and dual link

Question

Our company wants to connect two different floors together about 150-200 feet apart. I was thinking fiber would be the best option for this but I don't have much experience so I would like to see if what I am thinking of doing would work. We have a Cisco Meraki MX-84 security appliance and a Cisco SG200-50 switch.

Based on my research it appears that the Meraki MA-SFP-1GB-SX transceiver is compatible with the MX-84 and the Cisco MGBSX1 transceiver is compatible with the SG200-50. I assume that these two transceivers would work together properly based on the fact they both operate at 850 nm wavelength and are both multimode fiber. Can anyone confirm if my assumption is correct?

Also I am wondering if it makes sense to have two links to each switch rather than a single link? I don't know if there is any benefit to running two links other than if one link fails it still has another link to work off of.

Docs for the Meraki SFP accessories https://meraki.cisco.com/lib/pdf/meraki_datasheet_sfp.pdf

Cisco SG200-50 specs https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/switches/small-business-200-series-smart-switches/data_sheet_c78-634369.html

Answer 1

It is the standard that you look for. In this case, it is 1000BASE-SX. Both of those transceivers use that standard, so they are compatible. It is much the same as Intel and 3Com 1000BASE-T copper transceivers that you would use on a copper-wired connection; as long as the transceivers use the same standard, they should work.

You can connect two switches with multiple links, but only one link will be active. STP chooses a single path to the root bridge. You may be able to use some type of link aggregation (Cisco etherchannel or port channel, LACP, etc.) to fool STP into thinking that the multiple links are a single link. With multiple links controlled by STP, it can take seconds to fail over to a new link, but with a channel, it only takes milliseconds to fail over. You also have the benefit of using the combined bandwidth, but only in aggregation, not for a single flow.