tjgeds Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 Hi, We’re looking at doing a switching project in our school and are looking at a few different options and was wondering if anyone could give us some advice/opinions on switch manufacturers. The three manufacturers we’re looking at are HP NETGEAR Meraki Any thoughts/opinions/advice would be most welcome along with any other recommendations anyone has. Thanks TJGEDS
Steve21 Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 Personally I would always say HP unless you got big bucks to spend But Procurve models not the lower unmanaged, so depends what you're after in terms of school setting etc. Do you need VLANs? or primary etc? Steve 1
tjgeds Posted March 5, 2015 Author Posted March 5, 2015 It is the Procurve models that we're looking as, in the long term, we're looking to section off parts of our network with VLAN's.
mikkydoos Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 Some of the lower end Cisco's are great and not too expensive 1
Davit2005 Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 As @Steve21 mentions, you want managed switches, layer 3 core switch and if cost is an option only layer 2 at edge. It depends how many devices/users we are talking about and of course if budget is tight you need to weigh it up i.e resilience and/or performance with features. 1
tjgeds Posted March 5, 2015 Author Posted March 5, 2015 Thanks for the reply. We have about 1500 students with 150 members of staff and around 800 PC's. Understand layer 3 core and layer 2 edge, possibly replacing up to 30 switches.
Millgate Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 Personally, I would recommend HP (if your budget allows). Great kit. Netgear are really good these days too, lifetime warranty etc plus the have good support. Meraki are owned by Cisco so that should say quite a bit. In terms of price, all 3 vendors have a pretty good "bid" process. You'll get a bigger % discount from HP. If you need any help or quotes on all 3, feel free to drop me a PM/email Luke 1
mikkydoos Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 I've got Netgear L3 and L2 switches. I'd stay well away. They're REALLY flaky. They run fine if left alone but the interface is terrible. 1
Michael Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 Most of my sites are mostly L2, some L3 HP's and require little attention to be honest. 1
tjgeds Posted March 5, 2015 Author Posted March 5, 2015 I've been told the new ones are good, how old are your switches?
mikkydoos Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 Pretty old - 2007. Enough to put me off from buying anymore. 1
Boredguy Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 We've got lots of Netgear L2 switches, and while the interface may not be the best in the world, they do the job for the price range they are in (and it's certainly better than the 2007 models) HP always get high recommendations but it depends on what your budget can stretch to 1
DavePa Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 Doing a similar project albeit on a smaller scale (17 switches). Looked at HP / Juniper / Meraki and was initially considering HP - better performance than the Juniper, cheaper than the Meraki. However, our Meraki reseller then came back with some bid pricing that reduced the cost of the Meraki switches (MS320-48LP, L3, PoE) from about £5500 each to (just) under £3000 each including a 5 year licence. Might be worth asking if you haven't already done so. 1
Marshall_IT Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 If you've got lots of money I'd recommend Extreme Networks, out of the three you've stated I'd go with hp. I had hp procure for years and they are really good. As everyone else has stated L3 core L2 everywhere else should be fine for what you need. Stay away from the old 3com switches that hp sell, they are normally identifiable by only having a 3 year warranty. 1
3s-gtech Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 We have a large number of HP (mostly V1910 now) and Cisco SG300 (with a few SG500). They're all pretty good with the latest firmware updates, and they weren't expensive. We did have all 25** and 26** series Procurve models, but when moving to 1Gb to desktop it wasn't practical cost wise to buy equivalents. Still happy with the overall setup. Procurve core switches though. 1
nicholab Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 (edited) Always Juniper, Cisco and HP as the kit manufacturer. Also have you thought about short patching using 1u switches. You should be looking at about 8 year life of a switch. Edited March 5, 2015 by nicholab 1
mdench Posted March 5, 2015 Posted March 5, 2015 HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP! Sorry! little bit of a fan as @Millgate I'm sure will confirm haha! What size school are you? How many switches etc? New core switching as well or just edge? 2
mcolbourn Posted March 13, 2015 Posted March 13, 2015 We have HP for our Core (54xx ZL series) and D-link (mainly DGS 1210 variants and a few 30XX series) for our edge. 1
tjgeds Posted March 13, 2015 Author Posted March 13, 2015 (edited) HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP HP! Sorry! little bit of a fan as @Millgate I'm sure will confirm haha! What size school are you? How many switches etc? New core switching as well or just edge? Hi @mdench We're about 1500 students and 150 staff. Number of switches is around 30 in total. We're already using a HP 5406zl as our core, it will need a few new modules to support the additional fibre we're going to run (going from 2 fibres to just over 20 I think), plus if we're upgrading to a 10Gbe backbone then it'll need an upgrade for that as well, but we think the chassis will do a perfectly good job. Away from that it will just be edge switching that we're looking at I think. Edited March 13, 2015 by tjgeds
mdench Posted March 13, 2015 Posted March 13, 2015 If your looking at going with 10Gb backone then take a look at the HP 2920 switch series we have just bought two and they are very nice! With your 5406 how full is it currently as the 10Gb modules only have 8 ports on them so if you want all of those 20 runs on 10Gb you'll be looking at 3 modules and then use whats left for everything else? 1
tjgeds Posted March 13, 2015 Author Posted March 13, 2015 The 2920 is one we're definitely looking at. In the 5406 we currently have 3 empty bays, plus we can remove the existing fibre module that we have installed (only does up to 1Gbe) so at the end of it we will still have 1 empty bay which can be used if we need it, so I think there's enough scope there to cover us for this project.
mdench Posted March 13, 2015 Posted March 13, 2015 Then I think you're covered just remember that the 2920 needs the extra module card in the back of it to do 10Gb but chat to Luke @Millgate and he'll be able to help you out with pricing etc. 1
Snuffkins Posted March 13, 2015 Posted March 13, 2015 We've used a few different vendors here in the past. We did use Extreme Networks for 7 years and they're well worth a look. We use Cisco now, 4500-Xs at the core and 3850s at the edge. Certainly can't fault them at all and the pricing was pretty competitive. Of course of the ones you're looking at I agree with the general consensus that HP are probably going to be your best bet, particularly if you're keeping the chassis that you already have, as mixing manufacturers can be a potential headache from experience, plus only needing understanding of interface is a plus.
pow Posted March 14, 2015 Posted March 14, 2015 (edited) After working with Meraki switches at another school, I'm quite happy with a NetGear Prosafe setup that is done correctly. The Meraki stuff is just so expensive and apart from looking good, I can't see what network level features they have over other brands! At my main place I'm just about to go 10GBE backbone, with this sitting at the core: M7100 | Managed Switches | Switches | Business | NETGEAR and these sitting as top-of-rack in other cabs: M5300 | Managed Switches | Switches | Business | NETGEAR. Where a little more than 48 ports are required, I'll use the current NetGear ProSafe GS's to increase the capacity. That way we will have a 10GB backbone Cat6a backbone (you could even LAG 2 10GB ports to give 20GB to each top of rack switch) with 1GB to every device in the school. The price point is fantastic as well, moving away from fibre means no messing around with running glass cables, stupidly expensive SFP+ modules and getting someone in to terminate them. At another small primary I have just installed one of Unifi's switches (as I am a massive fan of their WIFI setup) which is running really nicely - if a little noisy! If I could afford I'd go full Cisco every time - I'm not a massive fan of their SB offerings. I've been burnt by HP switches just 'halting' before so tend to steer clear of them. Edited March 14, 2015 by pow
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