NICE-PRICED SWITCHES

摘要

It's amazing what a modest amount of money will get you in the switch market. NETWORK COMPUTING put out a call for inexpensive, managed Ethernet switches with enterprise features-specifically, a 24-port 10/100 switch with at least one Gigabit Ethernet uplink port that retails for less than $750. Administrative tools were an important consideration in terms of quality and type, especially with respect to VLAN (virtual LAN) and port configuration. Although we weren't looking for raw throughput or performance, we did want easy setups, support coverage and management, and monitoring options, such as SNMP support. We weren't expecting the world with these switches. But an administrator with only a basic understanding of network concepts should be able to set up and maintain these products using only publicly available sources, such as the user manual and vendor Web site. Adtran, Allied Telesyn, Netgear, ProCurve Networking by Hewlett-Packard and SMC Networks rose to our challenge, with Allied and Netgear shipping us two models each, for a total of seven switches.