Dlink DGS-2205 ... died

[Psi*]

This is a gigabit ethernet switch, that I have had for a few years, was found dead this morning. Apparently its final moments were sometime over night. Suspicion is that it died of natural causes although Jupiter, aka Buzzy aka yellow cat, is looking guilty. What Juipter's motive could have been much less modus operendi is yet to be surmised. Jupiter was allowed to go free after questioning. Although Jupiter could not explain the unusual sounds of running & hissing sounds heard in the wee hours of the morning. Jupiter was too quick to offer up his possible accomplice, Arfur aka big furry black cat, and or Norman.

Arfur has yet to be questioned as he left the premises early this AM. Additional questioning of Norman, aka black Cocker Spaniel, afforded little additional information except for grossly overclocked tail wagging.

Unfortunately the position must be filled ... that of the ethernet switch. Ideas, thoughts, and/or referrals for possible candidates are now being received. Anyone have a favorite? It's been years since I looked anything like this.

RIP Dlink DGS-2205
Faithful 24X7 Service

 

[Doomsday]

han, What ye talk about?!

 

[Psi*]

I'm just looking for a new Ethernet switch ... they are all pretty much the same aren't they?

It did force me to de-fur the HSF in 1 computer tho before I realized that there was no network connectivity at all. Of course the other machines were off.

 

[Rob Williams]

Haha, I laughed out loud at this thread, despite the death of a perfectly good switch. Out of curiosity, did any of the cats sleep on the switch for prolonged periods of time? Those things get warm, so they attract cats like nothing else. Of course, a cat on a router or switch means even more heat inside the box, which can end up degrading the hardware.

Sadly, I am not a networking guy at all, so I'm not even sure where to begin, although I know that TRENDnet makes some great products (including switches). Brett also deals with networks a fair bit, although he's more into breaking them than fixing them ;-) I'll point him to this thread and see if he has some suggestions.

 

[Tharic-Nar]

Or a Bee flew into it.... or a Smoking Bee from Apple..... maybe that's why the Bee's are dying out....

Anyway. How many ports? If Gigabit is required, need to make sure it supports Jumbo frames, preferably as high as possible (9k to 16k, 4k seems standard but might leave you feeling a little lacking)... of course, as long as the surrounding hardware supports jumbo frames.

 

[Psi*]

The cat is nick named Buzzy ... for Buzz Lightyear although i have absolutely no idea why. It is the g/f idea.

The dLink I had was 5 port. I can live with 4 ... jumbo frames ... hmmmm, good thought. Gigabit is necessary.

I am thinking pretty cheap although the dLink lasted several years. So maybe I won't go to the bottom of the barrel for the replacement. I did see something I looked at this afternoon that had a lifetime warranty ... but what good are those anyway? I never send anything back. So lets say that price is not an issue & see where that goes.

BTW what is managed & unmanaged?

No. It was not a bed for a cat. I used a voltmeter on the wall power supply for it & it was ok. The power light comes on when plugged in & that is it ... no blinky on the rest of the lights. At 1st I though that al-l-ll of the Ethernet ports on the computers had gotten zapped by it ... tense moments for a while. Buzzy & I were trading evil looks.

 

[Tharic-Nar]

Typically, more expensive switches will support larger jumbo frames, about 20 varieties of VPN passthrough and more protocol standards than you can wave a stick at. I have a netgear GS605v2, it's a 5 port, quite cheap, though it's jumbo packet support is lacking. I will have to warn though, some older computer NIC's may run into buffering problems and die with GBit and jumbo frames**. Stating the obvious here, but, Jframes typically have to be set manually within hardware preferences on each NIC and transfers are limited to the slowest device in the link.

Can dig around if you want, most in the same price range will be the same, give or take a few % in some obscene 'raw' performance test. Typically, go with the company you feel most comfortable with.

When it comes to user reviews in the cheap range, they will be wild, from great to bad, but that's the deal when you go cheap, it's a lucky dip. More people have them, more people review them, unfortunately, a lot of faults can be user error, especially with wireless, but when it comes to switches, there isn't much to go wrong... apart from maybe using a CAT5 cable for gigabit instead of 5e or 6...

Managed/unmanaged...
If you have to ask... you probably don't need it, lol. Seriously though, managed switches allow for all sorts of things like balance loading, keep different domains and networks apart on the same device, disable certain ports, limit port speeds, and, urm, a lot of stuff i don't know nor understand... It largely depends on the device.

**My server has this problem. If a file transfer exceeds the total system RAM, it will lead to a buffering problem, resulting in throughput crashing to a couple megabits and Kernel processing maxing (on a single core). Only fix is to physically turn off the computer (at the mains)... That or get a decent NIC. Integrated NIC's on motherboards can be terrible sometimes...

 

[Psi*]

Thanks! I googled "jumbo frames" & ended up ... where else but at 'egg. I found this Netgear, but I am awful about mail-in rebates.

There is this HP, who are they? ... I thought all of that stuff became "Agilent", with 8 ports & 144 KB packet buffer. That sounds good & don't know if I should care. 8 ports is over kill but it still is not too pricey. $70 versus $30 is not a big deal ... still reading tho.

I also have in the back of my mind a possible new opportunity to setup a couple of new small engineering offices, small manufacturing, & test lab. This just did come up & the coming week will hopefully prove out that opportunity. This is *not* what I do, but the lab is what I will need & is "what I do". I am thinking that I could get some basics on network setup with good components. The lab equipment will be Agilent test gear & will be put on the network.

So managed sounds like something that I might investigate a bit further for this office. Although I suspect that the office will be only slightly larger than my own for number of "computers" connected.

I never would have paid attention to "Jframes" or jumbo frames had you not suggested. thanks again.