Help me pick out a new switch

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bastage

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Mar 4, 2010
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Currently I have a Hodge Podge of Switches & even an honest to god 10/100 hub in use in my house spread between a few different locations. The worst is right behind my WHS where I have all the cables from throughout the house coming together.

What I need is a 10/100/1000 switch of good solid reliable quality that doesn't cost an arm & a leg. & I Need it to be at-least 16 port (currently have a 8 port & a 5 port daisy chained at this location). I Will also be grabbing a decent 8 port for my living room to replace my hub I currently have in use (currently using 4 ports here. & a smallest of whatever I can find for my master bed where I am just swapping the Ethernet cable between devices here regularly.

So any recommendations on decent quality switches that will do?
 
What about something like a Procurve 1810-24G? It can be had for around $350. It has a lifetime warranty and next day replacement.

You might also look at Netgear (you can do model comparison and selection on their site) as well as SMC, DLink just to name a couple of others.
 
Does it need to be managed, and what's your budget? There's a bunch of options out there, but both these things are quite vital in choosing one.
 
On a budget I would go TRENDnet green, Netgear Prosafe, D-Link, or SMC maybe. They all offer 16 port gig switches under $175.
 
If all you need is multiple ports for simple home use, you can get larger unmanaged switches quite cheap. I got a TRENDnet TEG-S16DG for $80 last month (I've had great results with all the TRENDnet switches I've bought). The D-Link that i-bystander linked is similar.

Enterprise reliability is nice, but a managed switch can add a lot of complexity and cost. If you go used, then you can be cutting into that reliability before you even start. A lot of enterprise stuff is designed to go in a rack in a datacenter, so you may find that it has tiny, loud fans and sucks quite a bit of power. I'm not trying to discourage you from going this route if that's really what you need/want, but as someone who has picked up a lot of enterprise gear retired from work (like a ProCurve 4000m with 9 of the 10 slots filled with modules), there are downsides to enterprise stuff as well.

If you don't need the advanced features and massive bandwidth support (i.e. you want GbE connections to everything, but won't be trying to send 1Gbps on every port at the same time, all the time), a cheap, silent unmanaged switch can be a perfect "port splitter" for a home network.
 
schnell said:
Most of these recommendations are wayyyyyy overkill for a normal home network. Most people have no real need for gigabit at home.

Boom fifty bucks.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833129181
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The people on hardocp usually dont have "normal" networks : P
If the OP wants to settle for 10/100 PM me. I'll sell you one way cheaper than that.
I do recommend gigabit tho if you have a tendency to zip files around your network computer to computer. The time sitting waiting for a file to copy sucks.


i-bystander said:
D-Link DGS-1024D 10/100/1000Mbps 24-Port Green Technology Rackmountable Switch

With Promo Code
EMCKGHE62

$109.99 shipped After $20.00 MIR

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...-EMC-032511-Index-_-Switches-_-17111031-L011D
Click to expand...
I agree with this switch. Works wonders for me at home and 20+ man Lan parties.
 
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Netgear Metal Box Prosafe is great, plus lifetime warranty.

TrendNet is also wonderful stuff for the money.
 
It may be overkill but I picked up a Dell Powerconnect 2724 refurbished from Overstock.com for $75. My office already has a Norco 4220 running in it, so if the switch is a little noisy I doubt I will hear it...
 
ok Budget needs to be around 100 bucks at most, Do not need managed & Gigabit is an ABSOLUTE MUST (multiple 1080p streams may be going at any given time, not to mention that all the encoding gets done on my desktop & transfered over sometimes 300gb at a time).

farscapesg1 said:
It may be overkill but I picked up a Dell Powerconnect 2724 refurbished from Overstock.com for $75. My office already has a Norco 4220 running in it, so if the switch is a little noisy I doubt I will hear it...
Click to expand...

Overkill yes, But the price is right.. Noise on the other hand wont fly
 
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I've had a Dell 2724 since they came out. Solid as a rock, never had a problem.
 
farscapesg1 said:
Good to hear. I figured for $75 it was worth a shot trying a refurbished model...
Click to expand...

Yea & I am not opposed to the refurb part of it. But I am opposed to the fan. I am kind of anal about fan noise & as it is the smallest fan in my office is the 100mm Scythe Shuriken on my server CPU. I Cant see adding anything with another small fan.
 
Not sure but I think the cheaper one its an older revision that had a fan and the more expensive one is the newest one.
Posted via Mobile Device
 
ok well its a done deal.. I ordered the newer one of those D-Link's from ebay. 87.42 shipped for the 24 port. And the seller is giving 30 days return on it so that should give me a chance to put it through the paces.
 
So new switch shipped. Now another question.. Is putting a dual gigabit NIC in the server worth the trouble? Currently have a Intel PCI Gigabit unit & I can pick up a Intel PCI-X Dual gigabit (will be usind in regular PCI) for 15 bucks shipped from fleabay. Obviously would prefer pcie but on a budget is it worth it to go with the dual gigabit nic. Will just be used to increase bandwidth to the switch where everything else will branch from there.
 
ok so I received the switch today.. And well 1st off I FUCKING HATE this thing.. The fan is redicolously loud. Its clearly louder the everything else in my office 8' behind me. That includes louder then my 6850 thats sitting on top of a Lian Li PitStop t7 (so its out in the open) 3' in front of me.

Anyone know how hot this D-Link will get if I pop the cover off & disc the fan?
 
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