Roles for the Desktop Switch and Switch 1000
Benefits of switching over bridging
A Core Competence Product Evaluation
Economics
Like all matters related to expanding and evolving a network infrastructure,
the decision to "go switched" is determined on the basis
of needs (features, management, performance) and cost. We illustrate
the relative cost of shared hubs and switches in the following
table, based on high-and-low street prices of representative equipment
in each category/classification:
(simple multiport repeater)
(multiport repeater with SNMP)
(SNMP agent with RMON support)
(multiport repeater with VLAN support, SNMP agent with RMON support, no bridging support)
(No SNMP, no VLAN, no bridging)
(multiport repeater with level 2 bridging, VLANs, SNMP agent)
This table basically says the following: (1) unmanaged shared
hubs are commodity; (2) SNMP with RMON is hot technology and hence
pricey; and (3) you can get introduce dedicated bandwidth through
switching in small configurations and large for about the same
per port cost. However, bandwidth should not be the only factor
considered when deploying Ethernet switching. We believe that
Network administrators and planners should be careful to consider
the difficult to measure but omni-present costs associated with
simplified adds, moves, and changes when weighing the relative
costs of equipment that provides VLAN support versus those that
do not. We thus recommend that if you are going to introduce Ethernet
switching, do so with VLAN-capable products.
Want to know more about VLANs
Product type 10 Base-T ports
Uplink port Unit cost
Cost Per 10 Mbps port
Unmanaged hub
24 AUI/BNC
$298- $529 $12 - $22
Managed hub
24 AUI/BNC
$799-$1328 $33 - $58
Managed hub
16 AUI
$1499 $62
Port switch hub
24 AUI/BNC
$1469- $1549 $61- $65
Ethernet switch
4-8 100 Mbps (0, 1 or 2)
$979 - $1149 $118 - $150
Ethernet switch
22-26 100 Mbps (1 or 2)
$2499 - $5299 $104 - $220