dgsmith Posted November 12, 2012 Posted November 12, 2012 Very quick question; on a tight budget and need to replace the current core which is a 2810 (not even a core, only layer 2)! 2910al is about £850 and the 3500yl is about £1500. They both do Layer 3 static routing and are capable of running with 10GB addin cards. Before we plump for the 2910al, is there any serious consideration we need to take on board with regards to running the 3500yl in the same manner, or is it just glorified with stuff we won't use/need?
Michael Posted November 13, 2012 Posted November 13, 2012 Between the two, I'd definitely go with the 2910al (J9146A) and not the 3500yl (J8692A). The 2910al has a switching capacity of 128Gbps, whereas the 3500yl has a switching capacity of 101.8Gbps. That is quite a big difference, especially as you're using it as a core switch. That's not to say the 3500yl is bad, but it probably has features you'd never use. 1
AngryTechnician Posted November 13, 2012 Posted November 13, 2012 Does the 2910al let you assign ACLs to the VLANs? We have plenty of switches than can do L3 VLAN routing, but only our beefier core switch can assign ACLs and actually make VLAN routing useful. 1
Michael Posted November 13, 2012 Posted November 13, 2012 Best advice is to consult the manual. I know us techies don't know what a manual is, but I'd suggest you download the PDF to be 100% certain
snoerre Posted November 13, 2012 Posted November 13, 2012 (edited) Buy a HP E4800 (== 3Com 4800G, HP A5500-EI, H3C S5500-EI) instead. The HP 2910al nor the 3500yl is a core switch. Sometimes you can get the 4800 pretty cheap @ebay. Get the one with at least a white HP label on it, if you buy refurbished/used. With the HP label on it, you get HP lifetime warranty, without you don´t. Release notes: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c03557213/c03557213.pdf => Yes, it does OSPF/ISIS/BGP/RIP routing in IPv4/IPv6 with PIM DM/SM/SSM multicast routing with IPv4/IPv6, plus 64 virtual routing instances, too. Edited November 13, 2012 by snoerre
dgsmith Posted November 13, 2012 Author Posted November 13, 2012 Between the two, I'd definitely go with the 2910al (J9146A) and not the 3500yl (J8692A). The 2910al has a switching capacity of 128Gbps, whereas the 3500yl has a switching capacity of 101.8Gbps. That is quite a big difference, especially as you're using it as a core switch. That's not to say the 3500yl is bad, but it probably has features you'd never use. Interesting.. I just assumed the 3500 would have better switching capability. Buy a HP E4800 (== 3Com 4800G, HP A5500-EI, H3C S5500-EI) instead. The HP 2910al nor the 3500yl is a core switch. Sometimes you can get the 4800 pretty cheap @ebay. Get the one with at least a white HP label on it, if you buy refurbished/used. With the HP label on it, you get HP lifetime warranty, without you don´t. Release notes: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c03557213/c03557213.pdf => Yes, it does OSPF/ISIS/BGP/RIP routing in IPv4/IPv6 with PIM DM/SM/SSM multicast routing with IPv4/IPv6, plus 64 virtual routing instances, too. We very unlikely to want to delve too deep in switch config or indeed use many of the features managed switches offer. I'm also not overly keen on the ex-3com stuff and even an ebay one of those above isn't financially enticing. In an ideal world we'd get a modular switch but money and space is limited so we're faced with the 2 choices I mentioned at the start. Be interesting to know if anyone runs the 2910 as a core and is reasonably happy with doing that?
Michael Posted November 14, 2012 Posted November 14, 2012 I do at numerous sites, works absolutely fine
snoerre Posted November 14, 2012 Posted November 14, 2012 (edited) I'm also not overly keen on the ex-3com stuff The 3Com 4800G is not based upon (old) 3Com techniques, it´s a relabeled H3C S5500-EI, You read the PDF above, did you? and even an ebay one of those above isn't financially enticing. - ebay archive - Currently 870,-£ for HP E4800. Don´t know that uk-shop, though. Be interesting to know if anyone runs the 2910 as a core and is reasonably happy with doing that? The 2910AL may have the better hardware, but is a cut down version of the 3500yl softwarewise. Software is more important than hardware. Edited November 14, 2012 by snoerre
Tallwood_6 Posted November 14, 2012 Posted November 14, 2012 We have a couple of 2910al used for iscsi, great switches I believe the 3500yl has a larger per port packet buffer so is better bet if you need to run flow control and jumbo frames which I doubt you will.
moomin Posted November 23, 2012 Posted November 23, 2012 Hi, The 3500 is better for a core than the 2910al as it supports more features, Provided you buy the premium pack. I would go for the newer 3800's though as they do not need this and have 10gb uplink ports built into it and support routing/vrrp etc so you can have a core that has resilient. You can stack a 3800 also so your core can start to do away with redundant links being blocked by spanning tree. Another good core would be the 5500-hi box which you can link together with the 2 10gb ports over irf and cheap copper sfp cables. If you only have a flat layer 2 network and you want to switch between say low end 2500's/2600s then a 2910 would work but its layer 3 and vrrp support is questionably poor. J
apeman Posted December 4, 2012 Posted December 4, 2012 3500yl is a much better switch than the 2910al
moomin Posted December 5, 2012 Posted December 5, 2012 Unless you forget to buy the premium license..
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