I have just configured an EX4600 and EX4300 mixed chassis. THere are 2 EX4600's and 1 EX4300. I have configured the VC using the preprovisioned method of
Set virtual-chassis member # serial-number 123456 role master/linecard
The EX4600 are both set to routing engine roles and the EX4300 is a line card. When running everything looks well and configured interfaces work correctly. However, I just shutdown the VC to move some hardware and when powering back up I did not power up the EX4300. I assumed that the VC would come up fine and that simply the EX4300 would show as not present.
Instead, on boot up of just the 2 EX4600's with the EX4300 remaining off, I received the message:
warning: This chassis is operating in a non-master role as part of a virtual-chassis system....
Then on login to the master it shows as linecard:0. Show virtual-chassis then shows both the EX4600 as linecard roles and the EX4300 is not present (as suspected)
Only when I boot up the EX4300 does the VC appear to become active again, the EX4600's become master and backup as they should, and then traffic starts flowing (configured ports become active),
What is causing this? My thought with VC is it should be redundant and should handle a switch failure or removal, especially of a linecard switch?