Network Infrastructure Question

[Lee_K_81]

Just out of interest what speed is your network infrastructure running at?

 

We have a large number of unmanageable HP 2324 switches running at 100Base-T, we're looking at upgrading a few, but not sure whether to get a 1000Base-T switch or just get manageable 100Base-T.

 

What is everybody else's infrastructure running at? Cost is a bit of an issue, but it's not worth buying 100Base-T if i really need to be running 1000Base-T. By the way we have thin clients, which is why i'm slightly leaning towards 1000Base-T.

 

Thanks

[plexer]

What is your backbone connected by fibre or copper.

 

If it's copper and you are going to be buying new switches anyway you will probably buy ones with multi personality ports i.e one thats can be copper or mini gbic for fibre modules.

 

This means you can plug all of your switches in with copper gigabit and give yourself and instant boost.

 

Ben

[enjay]

The IT Suites (and my office!) run at 1Gig, the rest of the network is 100meg, with Gig uplinks where available. The switches are mostly managed, although the level of control that management offers varies from switch to switch, the oldest ones are more like a read-only view of device status than anything you would class as "management".

 

We've taken the decision not to rip out any existing switches, but when they fail or we need an extra one, we're buying managed 24-port gig switches as standard. We put the new gig one into a high-volume area and move the 100 from there to wherever the "new" switch is needed).

 

At present, the only devices with Gig NICs are in the IT Suite, however as we are speccing all new computers with Gig, it won't be long before it is wider spread.

[ICT_GUY]

1 gigabit coper backbone

3 10/100 managed switches

1 24 port gigabit managed switch

Buying a managed 48 port gigabit managed switch for the new suite.

 

Not bad for a small primary school.

[Geoff]

We have a 'core' switch which is a HP ProCurve 4204 with several miniGBIC modules in. These modules hold fibre SX miniGBICs. These fibre links run at 1Gb/s. They head off to the various locations in the school buidings. At the other end there is either a HP ProCurve 2650/2610 or a 3com 3300 (being phased out). If there is need for more switch capacity at a paticular location then an extra switch is daisy chained off the spare GigE port on the ProCurve. Usually this is another ProCurve so we can maintain a Gbit link.

 

The only exception are is in the main building, the server room and IT, where we use copper to connect some of the cabinets together. There's no requirement for fibre as it's an internal building connection and below the length limitation for Cat6. The Server room has it's own fibre link into the 4204 which connects into a ProCurve 2810-24G. This runs all it's ports at 1Gbit. Most of our servers are running one or more GigE NICs.

[Lee_K_81]

Backbone is fiber, new switches will have dual personality ports.

 

Good point there about client NICs Nick, checked out thin client spec and they are only 10/100Base-T. No point plugging them into gigabit switches just yet.

 

I'm thinking that as long as my uplinks are gigabit then 100Base-T will suffice in the short term for clients to plug into, with gigabit in certain key areas.

[Stevenw]

we are in the process of upgrading our backbone from 100mb copper to gigabit fibre then 100mb to workstations still 10mb in a few places

[Geoff]

I'm thinking that as long as my uplinks are gigabit then 100Base-T will suffice in the short term for clients to plug into, with gigabit in certain key areas.

 

This is yet another reason to get managed switches. As they support snmp queries you can get per port counters of usage. Combined with something like Cacti:

 

Cacti: The Complete RRDTool-based Graphing Solution

 

You can see where your bandwidth is being used, where the problems are and when and if you need to think about upgrading either your backbone link or your switch in a paticular location to support higher speeds.

[TronXP]

Core Switch (D-LINK DES-6500 - Fibre + 1Gb copper Modules) Links to other cabs in schools over either Fibre running at 1Gb or Copper at 1Gb. We try to get a 1 Gb link to each switch but at the moment thats not always possible so there are some daisy chaining.

 

In the cabs we use D-Link DGS-3024/3048 switches and have a few old unmanaged DES-1024R(100mb) which are to be replaced in the next few weeks.

 

Most our computers are now running at 1Gb and the last of the 100mb will be replaced over the summer.

[SYNACK]

Core: 2x Cisco 3750 24port gigabit switches stacked (layer3 managed)

Edge: 4x 48port gigabit D-link 1248T (almost layer2 managed)

Links: 2gb trunks to each edge switch over fiber

 

Only about half of our stuff runs at gigabit so far but the offending old pcs are being replaced slowly. All fat clients. Runs well for our school (primary) as we can chuck whatever we want through the network and have yet to come up with any speed issues.

[SpuffMonkey]

This is yet another reason to get managed switches. As they support snmp queries you can get per port counters of usage. Combined with something like Cacti:

 

Cacti: The Complete RRDTool-based Graphing Solution

 

You can see where your bandwidth is being used, where the problems are and when and if you need to think about upgrading either your backbone link or your switch in a paticular location to support higher speeds.

 

Cacti is god like!

[gshaw]

We're redoing our cabling at the moment as it's a horrible mess! Getting a 5406zl at the core, all servers running at Gigabit to it. Then Gigabit fiber links out from the miniGBIC modules to HP 2610-24s in satellite cabinets in the classrooms.

 

Workstations connect via Cat5e at 100Mb speed, hardware can support Gigabit but the cost of Cat6 cabling and switches still costs a fair bit more, so new Cat5e is going in the rooms rather than 6

[enjay]

Workstations connect via Cat5e at 100Mb speed, hardware can support Gigabit but the cost of Cat6 cabling and switches still costs a fair bit more, so new Cat5e is going in the rooms rather than 6

 

Why not run Gigabit over Cat5e?

[Geoff]

Why not run Gigabit over Cat5e?

 

I'd rather run GigE over Cat6 personally.

[enjay]

I'd rather run GigE over Cat6 personally.

 

To the extent that you would stick to 100 if you couldn't afford to re-cable? While Cat6 is preferable to Cat5 for GbE, I'd still take GbE on Cat5 than 100Mb on Cat5, personally.

[DMcCoy]

I'd rather run GigE over Cat6 personally.

 

Gigabit is perfectly fine over 5e, I run around 150 clients (rest not replaced yet) at 1Gb with no cat 6 at all. I even have one room which has passed Gb certification and its only cat 5! (although all 20m or less runs).

[gshaw]

Hmm I've heard conflicting views on Gig over Cat5e, some say it's fine others aren't so sure

 

Either way at the moment can't afford 18x2810s but can get 18x2610s so one day if we wanna try it the option is there I guess, tbh I doubt we're using the bandwidth of 100Mb at the moment considering there's 250 odd clients off one Gigabit link (yup I know!)

 

But surely if you really want full Gigabit to desktops the backbone needs to be going 10Gb to accommodate the bandwith should the clients all be going for it at once?

Edited May 22, 2008 by gshaw

[TronXP]

we run 1Gb over cat5e. So far no major issues

[bossman]

1Gb fibre backbone, 100Mb cat5e, cat6 to every client from 100Mb switches no problems on the cat5e. All switches linked via OM3 fibre which allows for scalability to 10Gb when we update, all switches to be swapped out to allow for 1Gb connection to clients.

Won't be swapping out switches for about another 2 years though.

Total cost around £40k for cisco with EMIs.

This cost is minimal when you think it will sustain the network for another 6 years if not longer less than 6K per year.

Have had good service from Cisco and they are so easy to manage with the kit that comes with them.

Not saying that cisco should be everyone's choice but just from our experiences we have found them to be very good.

Edited May 22, 2008 by bossman

[TronXP]

bossman, don't want to hijack the thread but OM3 fibre, can I stick on my exsisting 1gb switchs onto it??

 

I admit am not really up on fibre technology. I would like to install OM3 in new builds but was worried I would have to buy new 10gb switches

[Geoff]

Yes you can do that.

[dave.81]

1GB fibre backbone to all buildings/cabinets, 100meg to desktops, there are a handful of switches that are linked via 100/1000 Cat5/5e but not many.

 

Am in the process of changing all Core/Edge switches to HP Procurve to give more management/monitoring over our netgear ones.

[plexer]

Best to use om3 fibre patch leads as well but yes you can.

 

Ben

[torledo]

Hmm I've heard conflicting views on Gig over Cat5e, some say it's fine others aren't so sure

 

Either way at the moment can't afford 18x2810s but can get 18x2610s so one day if we wanna try it the option is there I guess, tbh I doubt we're using the bandwidth of 100Mb at the moment considering there's 250 odd clients off one Gigabit link (yup I know!)

 

But surely if you really want full Gigabit to desktops the backbone needs to be going 10Gb to accommodate the bandwith should the clients all be going for it at once?

 

so long as all the components are cat5e have been certified, so that's patch cords, panels and horizontal cable runs then gigabit over cat5e isn't a problem.

 

If the cabling has been installed correctly so that the permanent links and channel links have passed and meet cat5e standards then there's no need for cat6 for gigabit. I think the doubt arises becuase of cat5e being unshielded therefore prone to interference from electrical cables, but the standards say that cat5 cable trays shouldn't be shared with electrical cabling. And a professional installation will ensure things like proper bend radius, no pinchng of cable.... right down to the patch panel level.

 

10gbe bacbone is much easier to upgrade to....it's just a change of optics at the switch level....10gbpe can run over existing OM3 fiber so i would call it a minimay disruptive upgrade. Even with 10gbpe you'd want some sort of fault tolerance within you're backbone rather than purely going for the one fat pipe approach

[Disease]

We have a complete Gigabit network pretty much apart from 1 or 2 rooms.:-)