Full Official English Description – Cisco Catalyst C9300-48S-E

1. Product Overview

2. Port Hardware Specifications

• Downlink Interfaces: 48 × Gigabit SFP slots, compatible with 1000BASE-SX, LX, ZX, BiDi and CWDM transceivers for multi-mode and single-mode fiber long-distance connections
• PoE Function: No PoE power supply circuits, zero PoE power budget
• Rear Modular Uplink Bay: 1 hot-swappable uplink module slot, supports modules with SFP+, SFP28, QSFP+ interfaces for 10G / 25G / 40G fiber uplink expansion
• Stacking Interfaces: Dedicated rear StackWise-480 stacking ports with 480 Gbps bidirectional stacking bandwidth; supports up to 8 switches grouped as one logical stack
• Management Interfaces:
  1 × RJ45 serial console port, 1 × USB Type-A console port
  1 × 1G out-of-band management Ethernet port
  1 × USB storage port for offline firmware upgrade, log export and configuration backup

3. Switching & Forwarding Performance

• Standalone Switching Capacity: 256 Gbps full-duplex
• Standalone Line-Rate Forwarding Rate: 190.47 Mpps
• Aggregated Stack Switching Bandwidth: Up to 736 Gbps
• Stack Aggregated Forwarding Rate: 547.62 Mpps
• MAC Address Table Capacity: 32,000 MAC entries
• IPv4 Routing Table: 32,000 route entries (24,000 direct routes + 8,000 indirect routes)
• IPv6 Routing Table: 16,000 route entries
• Multicast Group Table: 8,000 multicast entries
• Shared Packet Buffer: 16MB hardware buffer for burst traffic absorption
• Hardware ACL Scale: 5,120 ingress rules + 5,120 egress rules
• Flow Table Capacity: 64,000 Flexible NetFlow flow entries

4. Power & Thermal Architecture

• Power Supply Support: 1 or 2 hot-swappable Platinum-efficiency AC power supplies with OIR (Online Insertion and Removal); factory default configuration ships with single 715W AC PSU (PWR-C1-715WAC-P)
• StackPower: Cross-stack power resource pooling to realize N+1 power redundancy across stack members
• Cooling System: 3 field-replaceable variable-speed hot-swap fans with redundant cooling design, low acoustic noise for office and data center rack deployment
• Universal Input Voltage: 100–240V AC, 50/60Hz mains input
• Typical Idle Power Consumption: Approximately 103W under standard operating load

5. Stacking & High Availability Technology

• StackWise-480: 480 Gbps high-speed stacking backplane, sub-50ms traffic convergence during stack member hardware failure
• SSO/NSF: Stateful Switchover and Nonstop Forwarding to avoid service interruption during stack supervisor failover
• Mixed Stack Compatibility: Fully inter-stackable with all Catalyst 9300 Series copper/fiber switches (T/P/U/H/S models), unified single logical management domain

6. Hardware-Accelerated Baseline Security (Network Essentials Feature Set)

• MACsec 256-bit AES hardware link encryption available on all fiber downlinks and uplink ports
• Trustworthy Systems secure boot, runtime integrity verification and digital firmware authenticity validation
• Endpoint authentication suite: IEEE 802.1X, MAB, basic WebAuth captive portal access control
• Layer 2 threat prevention: Dynamic ARP Inspection (DAI), DHCP Snooping, IP Source Guard, BPDU Guard, broadcast/multicast storm suppression
• Secure management transport: SSH, HTTPS, SNMPv3 encrypted communication channels
  Limitation: ETA malware detection, TrustSec SGT microsegmentation and IPsec encryption are exclusive to Network Advantage (-A) license tierCisco

7. Layer 2 & Layer 3 Protocol Support

Layer 2 Full Feature Set

Layer 3 Routing Protocols (Restricted by Essentials License)

8. Software & Cisco DNA Licensing Ecosystem

• Operating System: Cisco IOS XE universal switch image (17.x release train)
• Preinstalled Perpetual License Tier: Cisco DNA Network Essentials
  Core feature scope includes complete Layer 2 switching, lightweight Layer 3 routing, basic telemetry, zero-touch provisioning, standard QoS and baseline DNA Center integration; it excludes ETA, TrustSec segmentation, containerized application hosting, ThousandEyes synthetic monitoring and full SD-Access fabric functions
• Supported Management Interfaces:
  Local CLI via console/SSH, embedded web UI, Cisco Catalyst Center (DNA Center), Cisco Prime Infrastructure, Zero-Touch Provisioning (ZTP)
• Programmability: Basic NETCONF/YANG streaming telemetry, limited on-box Python guest shell functionality

9. Physical & Environmental Specifications

• Form Factor: 1 Rack Unit (1RU) standard 19-inch EIA rack-mount chassis
• External Dimensions: 445 mm (W) × 488 mm (D) × 44 mm (H) / 17.5 × 19.2 × 1.73 inches
• Chassis Weight (single PSU installed): 7.66 kg (16.89 lbs); max weight with dual PSUs: 8.0 kg (17.6 lbs)
• Operating Ambient Temperature: 0°C ~ +40°C
• Storage Temperature: -40°C ~ +70°C
• Operating Humidity: 5% – 90% non-condensing
• MTBF Rating: 178,600 hours under standard factory operating conditions
• Compliance Certifications: UL, CSA, CE, FCC Class A, ICES-003, RoHS, TAA compliant

10. Model Naming Breakdown

• C9300: Base Catalyst 9300 stackable enterprise switching platform
• 48S: 48-port 1G SFP fiber non-PoE hardware chassis
• E: Pre-activated Cisco DNA Network Essentials perpetual license tier

11. Typical Deployment Scenarios

1. Small & medium enterprise campus inter-building fiber distribution without complex routing requirements
2. Fiber-to-the-desk office networks and industrial workshop access with EMI isolation demand
3. Low-scale IP surveillance backbone aggregation where PoE power is deployed on front-end access switches
4. Simple branch office fiber stacking deployments relying only on basic Layer 3 connectivity
5. Entry-level non-fabric aggregation layer without SD-Access segmentation architecture

Key Distinction Note

• -E (Network Essentials): Baseline Layer 2 & lightweight Layer 3, no advanced routing, ETA or TrustSec features, lower procurement cost
• -A (Network Advantage): Full advanced routing suite, ETA malware analytics, TrustSec microsegmentation, SD-Access fabric and container application hosting capabilities