You can use FortiSwitch-5003A fabric channel switching for communication
between the fabric backplane interfaces of FortiGate-5001A or 5005FA2 boards
installed in a FortiGate-5050 chassis.

Figure 16

shows a FortiGate-5050 chassis with a FortiSwitch-5003A board in

hub/switch slot 2, and FortiGate-5001A boards in slots 3, 4, and 5. In this
configuration the FortiSwitch-5003A board provides 1-gigabit fabric backplane
switching for the FortiGate-5001A fabric2 interfaces. The FortiSwitch-5003A
boards operate as layer-2 switches and the FortiGate-5001A boards operate as
typical standalone FortiGate units.

The chassis can be connected to the network using any of the FortiGate-5001A
front panel interfaces. You can also connect FortiSwitch-5003A front panel fabric
interfaces to the network. You can also install FortiGate AMC modules in the
FortiGate-5001A boards and connect the network to the AMC front panel
interfaces. The AMC modules and the network connections are not shown in

Figure 16

Figure 16: FortiGate-5050 fabric channel 2 data communication

SMC

POWER

5050SAP

SERIAL

ALARM

10/100

link/Act

ETH0 Service

RESET

ATUS

Hot Swap

link/Act

ETH0

ETH1

10/100

5000SM

10/100

link/Act

ETH0 Service

RESET

ATUS

Hot Swap

link/Act

ETH0

ETH1

10/100

5000SM

Fabric channel 2
data communication