[geeks] Networking stuff

[Greg A. Woods]

[ On Thursday, October 11, 2001 at 15:11:35 (-0400), Big Endian wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: [geeks] Networking stuff
>
> Beyond that (the 4000s max out at 80 ports/switch but will probably 
> be much less for you) you should look into  an HP 4108GL 
> (http://www.hp.com/rnd/products/switches/switch4108GL/summary.htm).

Unless you're going for over 300 ports the HP-4000m is still the best
deal -- you can trunk them together in a full mesh with gigabit cards.

Once you get up over 300 ports then you want to start looking for
switches with telco 50-pin connectors (to connect to your patch panels)
and good support for trunking multiple units together using multiple
simultaneous gigabit links.

Of course up over 300 ports, especially for workstations, you start
running into ethernet's physical limits -- it's nearly impossible to
comfortably fit more than about 300 workstations into any kind of office
space and still be within reach of the switch, so then you end up
distributing your switches to wiring closets again and using fibre to
trunk them together to a core switch anyway.

As for speed, well if you've got mostly just workstations then by using
a gigabit-only core switch with gigabit links to your servers, the
HP-4000m's will still be over-kill anyway.

-- 
							Greg A. Woods

+1 416 218-0098      VE3TCP      <gwoods at acm.org>     <woods at robohack.ca>
Planix, Inc. <woods at planix.com>;   Secrets of the Weird <woods at weird.com>