Life of switch gear?

[localzuk]

Quick question really - how often do you guys replace your switches in schools?

 

I saw a comment by someone saying 8 years earlier, which would mean I should be replacing ours here now pretty much!

 

I know our switches have a lifetime warranty, but I don't want to run them into the ground and then have a period of switches randomly dying.

[Boredguy]

We replace ours as and when the need occurs.

Our last refresh was in the summer as we needed to upgrade our PoE switches to managed ones to support the vLan'ing of the Wireless properly. The remainder of our non-PoE switches remained in situ.

 

I would imagine that unless a switch fails we won't be upgrading anything again until 10Gb backbone is financially viable for us.

[hardtailstar]

We upgraded ours in 2012, not sure when they were done before that as there isnt any documentation.

[IrritableTech]

The previous lot here was replaced after ten years. It was starting to show the strain so we took the opportunity to upgrade. I planned for the replacement lot to last about the same length of time.

[mjk]

I budget plan for six years and decide at the time whether they need replacing. Sometimes we shift the money around to buy better uplinks etc as the school needs them.

[seustice]

As and when here, HP lifetime warranty is great, so we just do it when we reach capacity or need to replace with PoE.

[JRowley]

Also as and when (and when budget allows) so most of ours are 10* years old. Also HP with lifetime warranty, only had to use it once to date. Edited March 5, 2015 by JRowley

[Michael]

Generally every 10 years, as throughput, management and technology developments come about.

 

It looks like Gigabit is still the maximum you can achieve from Cat5e used in 85%+ networks worldwide, but you'd think they'd be able to squeeze more out of it, without the need to re-wire a whole building.

[Jamman960]

I'm planning for around 10 but will be looking to upgrade ours in the next year(6 years) or so if we go for 802.11ac AP's and a voip phone system

[tmcd35]

Currently, if it's got a pulse...

 

I am putting in a 7 year cycle refresh starting next year and doing 3 switches a year.

[witch]

I've only changed them when I went up to gigabit switches. Other than that - they just keep going

[3s-gtech]

When they fail. We went from 100Mb to desktop upto 1Gb to desktop last year as part of the Learning in Digital Wales project so we should be set for a good while now (or until I start needing 10Gb links).

[psydii]

depends on funding streams. Given a 10/100 edge and no stomach for a massive investment I've moved to a rolling programme once they reach 5 years old, with a goal of having them all replaced by the time they would have been 10yrs. However if I had 5 year old gig switches and a 10gb core (as I had the last place I worked) then I would be waiting until they were 8 years old before beginning to plan out replacing them from year 9 onwards.

 

Finally don't underestimate the cabling. Here I have cat 6 end to end, so don't have to factor it into the cost of network refresh for at least another 10 years (it has a 25year warranty), where as in my previous place we had a mix of cat 5 and poorly installed cat 5e so each year we would replace a chunk so that we got to the stage where it was fully documented and trusted, and in places will support 10gbe when that finally makes it to the desktop (likely in only a few years, it's getting quite common in servers now)

[dgsmith]

When they fail.

 

Pretty much that. The only other exception is when we opted to go with procurve brand consistency and changed out dlinks, netgears etc when money allowed but otherwise we just run them to death or until there is a justified need to replace with one that has poe for example (but to be fair most of them are no older than 07/08 currently). We have a full 48 port as a spare anyway and HP send replacements next day so we'd have to be really unlucky to have 2 die on the same day.

[Tall_Paul]

Same as everyone else really, when they die!

 

Ours are almost 6 years old now. Can't imagine a bit reinvestment unless we move to 10GbE but with the way budgets are going I doubt that is going to be a concern in the near future.