Arista DCS-7020R4M-48Y-8QC-R | 7020R4 48-Port 25G Switch, 8x 100G QSFP+, MACsec

Q: What does the 'M' designation mean in the SKU?
A: The 'M' indicates enhanced hardware encryption support, specifically MACsec, IPsec, and VXLANsec capabilities for line-rate traffic encryption. This makes the switch suitable for secure multi-tenant environments, government deployments, and compliance-sensitive data center interconnect applications.

Q: What is the difference between -R and -F airflow variants?
A: The -R suffix denotes rear-to-front airflow (exhaust from port side), while -F indicates front-to-rear airflow. The -R variant is designed for standard hot-aisle/cold-aisle data center cooling configurations where cold air enters from the rear (fan side) and exhausts from the front (port side).

Q: Is this switch suitable for spine or leaf deployments?
A: Yes, the 7020R4M is designed as a universal leaf/spine switch router. With 48x 25GbE ports for server connectivity and 8x 100GbE uplinks, it works effectively as a high-density leaf switch or as a spine switch in smaller to mid-sized data center fabrics supporting EVPN/VXLAN overlays.

Q: Does the switch support EVPN and VXLAN for modern data center fabrics?
A: Yes, the 7020R4M runs Arista EOS and fully supports EVPN/VXLAN overlay networking, making it ideal for software-defined data center fabrics, multi-tenant environments, and modern leaf-spine architectures with Layer 2 and Layer 3 gateway functionality.

Q: What management and automation options are available?
A: The switch integrates with Arista CloudVision for centralized management, streaming telemetry, and network-wide visibility. It supports programmable automation via eAPI, OpenConfig, and gNMI for DevOps workflows, along with traditional CLI, web GUI, and SNMP management interfaces.