Branded v. no brand GBIC's

[Oops_my_bad]

Looking to get several netgear GBICS - cheapest I have found is £106ea at probrand.

However hardware.com has the unbranded version for just £43.00 - apparently they are what the manufacturers use but stick their own labels on them - is this correct? Am I better off getting these or should I just play safe and pay for the branded ones? (I would definitely get the netgear ones but their lifetime warranty on business kit doesnt extend to GBIC's).

[Geoff]

In theory all mini-GBICs are equal. However in practice thay are not. Some will be faster/more reliable than others. Basically, everyone makes their mini GBICs in China. Apart from Cisco and 3com who get theirs from Japan.

I'd trust Japanese electronics over Chinese any day of the week.

[leon]

The HP GBICS I bought this summer are Malaysian :-P.

[DMcCoy]

With Procurves you can only use HP Gbics in later revisions of the firmware, I had a revision A and a cisco Gbic that I had to get rid of as they no longer worked. Fake HPs also stop working in later revisions :P

[Geoff]

That's a bit naughty of them.

[Ric_]

That's a bit naughty of them.

To be fair, HP do give you a lifetime warranty on the switch (and their GBICs) so they are probably only protecting themselves against people putting crap in their switches and then sending them back when it all goes tits up.

[Geoff]

True I suppose. I think Cisco do the same too.

[Oops_my_bad]

With Procurves you can only use HP Gbics in later revisions of the firmware, I had a revision A and a cisco Gbic that I had to get rid of as they no longer worked. Fake HPs also stop working in later revisions :P

Do you know if Netgear pull the same kind of trick?

[DMcCoy]

No idea I'm afraid, Hp do mention it on their web site though, so it should say somewhere if netgear do too.

[tosca925]

We have used DLink GBIC in our Netgears without any problems

[Sylv3r]

I bought 5 HP gbics about 2 weeks ago - although they are generally not the cheapest as has been said they will uphold their warranty on the switches plus I am running the latest firmware on the switches and I was worried incase I hit problems with them not working.

[maniac]

HP will uphold the warrenty no problems, I've had tonnes of replacement kit from them under warrently over the last few years.

Lifetime warrenty really is lifetime, and they're very prompt with delivery too and provide pre paid stickers to send the faulty parts back. Top marks for their support!

Mike.

[john]

Netgears are fine on warranty support, all the ProSafe stuff is lifetime now which is great.

[Grommit]

Looking to get several netgear GBICS - cheapest I have found is £106ea at probrand.

However hardware.com has the unbranded version for just £43.00 - apparently they are what the manufacturers use but stick their own labels on them - is this correct? Am I better off getting these or should I just play safe and pay for the branded ones? (I would definitely get the netgear ones but their lifetime warranty on business kit doesnt extend to GBIC's).

They are not unbranded... they are EXTREME

EXTREME make very good switches

http://www.extremenetworks.com/index.aspx

http://www.mayflex.com/manufacturer/...-switch-uk.htm

[Grommit]

With Procurves you can only use HP Gbics in later revisions of the firmware, I had a revision A and a cisco Gbic that I had to get rid of as they no longer worked. Fake HPs also stop working in later revisions :P

Do you know if Netgear pull the same kind of trick?

Whats the moral of the story.... ??/ If it ain't broke don't fix it...