Server Fault Stack Exchange
Server Fault Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [switch]

a device that bridges network segments, operating at the OSI link layer level.

Switches (in the context of this site) are devices with multiple network ports, which allow interaction between all devices connected to these ports.

Basic switches operate at the data link layer level (in TCP/IP networks) and forward packets based on the link layer address in the packet headers. They are different to hubs in the way that hubs generally broadcast incoming packets to all other ports, whereas switches keep tables of link layer addresses they have seen at specific ports and only forward packets to the relevant ports. Basic switches are also known as layer 2 devices.

Higher grade switches can include functionality at higher layers of the OSI stack. This can range from IGMP snooping (for multicast support) and VLANs through to NAT, VPN, firewalls or even application layer functionality (web caching or proxying). Such switches are known as multilayer devices.

1515 questions
9
votes
4 answers

Someone crashed a whole network with a single switch

This might not be a real question, my apologies, but I'm pretty sure it will make your doomsday scenario enjoyment work a little. My company act as a contractor for a larger company. We need to plug various devices on their internal network. They…
Eric
  • 341
  • 4
  • 12
9
votes
3 answers

Server-to-Switch Trunking in Procurve switch, what does this mean?

I am looking to set up switch redundancy in a new datacenter environment. IEEE 802.3ad seems to be the go-to concept on this, at least when paired with a technology that gets around the "single switch" limitation for the link aggregation. Looking…
MattUebel
  • 927
  • 4
  • 13
  • 32
9
votes
4 answers

How long do managed gigabit ethernet switches take to boot up?

One critical drawback that I have found in researching managed-switches, and one that I have some past experience with is that anything with "lots" of firmware is going to have lots of issues associated with that firmware. We are in the middle of…
Warren P
  • 1,195
  • 8
  • 21
  • 35
9
votes
6 answers

What Ethernet twisted pair cable is best with a particular Ethernet switch

tl;dr I want the appropriate Ethernet cable for my Ethernet switch. How do I correlate Ethernet cabling speeds measured in hertz with an Ethernet switch "speed" measured in bits-per-second bandwidth? There are several Ethernet twisted pair cabling…
JamesThomasMoon
  • 725
  • 2
  • 5
  • 24
8
votes
4 answers

How can I use a web interface that requires a much older browser?

I have an old Netgear GS700TP that can only be managed via its web ui. For the most part, that works ok, but the page specifically where you assign ports to a specific VLAN doesn't render in current chrome, firefox, IE, etc. Anyone have any…
Dan Pisarski
  • 235
  • 4
  • 9
8
votes
1 answer

Configure Juniper M320 as Ethernet/STM transparent converter

There is Juniper M320. We need to move ALL the traffic from one port to another. Everything that comes to one port goes to another and vice versa. No snooping or any other processing is required. One port is going to be Ethernet and another one is…
Konstantin
  • 131
  • 4
8
votes
3 answers

VMWare distributed switch, VMs from different hosts cannot ping one another

I am using ESXi 5.1 in the hosts, I have setup a distributed switch with corresponding uplink and port groups. When migrating to distributed switch, it seems that VMs from the same host can ping one another, but pinging VMs on different hosts…
maiky
  • 139
  • 2
  • 3
  • 13
8
votes
2 answers

HP ProCurve 2920 switch stack topology for TWO switches? Ring vs. Chain vs. trunk?

I have a customer whose two HP ProCurve 2910al PoE switches have failed. This was backing a VoIP deployment for a small call center. They are interested in replacement PoE switches, but there's a concern about the stack design. This is primarily…
ewwhite
  • 197,159
  • 92
  • 443
  • 809
8
votes
2 answers

Connecting two devices over 10Base-T Ethernet without a Switch

I am trying to connect two devices one of which is only capable of 10Mbps and does not support auto-negotiation. (The other is a black box, I am unsure how to tell whether it supports auto-negotiation, although it works when connected to my PC at…
Weir_Doe
  • 191
  • 5
8
votes
1 answer

Layer 2 Loop Avoidance: Three Switches in Series

I know this seems like a homework question, but it's actually part of a larger project (and network) and need to break it down into chunks so I'm clear with what I'm doing. I've never worked with [R/M]STP and have only setup a static LAG before, so…
WuckaChucka
  • 375
  • 3
  • 8
  • 23
8
votes
1 answer

Is bonding mode=5 a solution against MAC flapping?

There is two are interconnected Cisco WS-2950T. By the one GBIC port on first switch connected a first NIC of bonding interface, and by the one GBIC port on second switch connected a second NIC of bonding interface. Of course the both switches sees…
jurijcz
  • 207
  • 3
  • 9
8
votes
2 answers

How managed switches handle Broadcast Multicast and Unicast?

Under typical scenarios, a network switch needs to handle broadcast, multicast and unicast messages at the same time. I'd like to understand On a typical managed switch (1Gb Ethernet/10Gb Ethernet), a) how are broadcast/multicast/unicast messages…
Anthony S.
  • 91
  • 1
  • 5
8
votes
4 answers

Cooling requirements for POE switches?

Is there any difference between POE switches and normal switches when budgeting for cooling capacity for a network closet? Normally, when I'm thinking about cooling; I can look at the power draw of a device and assume that for every watt I dump into…
chris
  • 11,944
  • 6
  • 42
  • 51
8
votes
1 answer

How compatible are SFPs really?

How compatible are sfp modules between devices. For example, am I likely to be able to plug something like this into a cisco, hp, or other switch with mini gbic ports?
Joel Coel
  • 12,932
  • 14
  • 62
  • 100
7
votes
3 answers

Recommended switch for an iSCSI implementation

We want to implement an iSCSI SAN and all of our testing has shown that we can implement this quite cheaply (Starwind target, refurbished HP Storage array). What concerns me is the throughput/latency of the switch itself, so open questions: Which…
Rick
  • 255
  • 3
  • 8
1 2 3
…
99 100