Im  new at networks, can someone explain the difference between a managed
and unmanaged switch. The price delta is a lot but I can't seem to find out
what the real world difference is to me between them, i,e I am setting us 6
sparcs and need a switch for them to communicate with each other.
Thanks in advance.

Roughly 12/9/03 16:59, JJ's monkeys randomly typed:

>  Im  new at networks, can someone explain the difference between a managed
> and unmanaged switch. The price delta is a lot but I can't seem to find out
> what the real world difference is to me between them, i,e I am setting us 6
> sparcs and need a switch for them to communicate with each other.
> Thanks in advance.

  A managed switch is one you can log into via telnet or web style
  interface to configure things.  An unmanaged switch lacks this.

  The one thing handy about a managed switch is that you can set the
  full duplex mode manually on the switch [and on the computer NIC]
  if normal autonegotiation fails.  If you have old SPARC's this
  may be necessary.  However, for the price of a cheap 6-8 port
  unmanaged switch, it would seem worth the risk of just trying it.

  If the SPARC's are 250 MHz or faster, they should be able to drive
  a 100 mbit ethernet at 10 Mbytes/second or better, even on a cheap
  Linksys.

-- 
Fan of the dumbest team in America.

Lon Stowell sez:
> Roughly 12/9/03 16:59, JJ's monkeys randomly typed:
> 
>>  Im  new at networks, can someone explain the difference between a managed
>> and unmanaged switch. The price delta is a lot but I can't seem to find out
>> what the real world difference is to me between them, i,e I am setting us 6
>> sparcs and need a switch for them to communicate with each other.
>> Thanks in advance.
> 
>   A managed switch is one you can log into via telnet or web style
>   interface to configure things.  An unmanaged switch lacks this.
> 
>   The one thing handy about a managed switch is that you can set the
>   full duplex mode manually on the switch [and on the computer NIC]
>   if normal autonegotiation fails.  If you have old SPARC's this
>   may be necessary.  However, for the price of a cheap 6-8 port
>   unmanaged switch, it would seem worth the risk of just trying it.
> 
>   If the SPARC's are 250 MHz or faster, they should be able to drive
>   a 100 mbit ethernet at 10 Mbytes/second or better, even on a cheap
>   Linksys.

I found that on unmanaged HP 2312 autonegotiation works fine
as long as it's the NIC that gets reset. If the switch is reset
it drops its port to half duplex while NIC remains at FDX. Of
course the fun part is that you won't notice until you put some
load on the connection.
So we're not buying unmanaged ones anymore.

Dima
-- 
The speed at which a mistyped command executes is directly proportional 
to the amount of damage done.                                       -- Joe Zeff