Cisco 550X Series switches provide true stacking capability, allowing you to configure, manage, and troubleshoot all switches in a stack as a single unit, with a single IP address for up to a maximum of 400 Ethernet ports.

A true stack delivers a unified data and control plane, in addition to management plane, providing flexibility, scalability, and ease of use because the stack of units operates as a single entity constituting all the ports of the stack members. This capability can radically reduce complexity in a growing network environment while improving the resiliency and availability of network applications. True stacking also provides other cost savings and administrative benefits through features such as cross-stack QoS, VLANs, LAGs, and port mirroring, which clustered switches cannot support.