[X-HW] Linksys Workgroup Gigabit Switch

[Ronald Chmara]

On Friday, January 17, 2003, at 02:59  PM, Mark Gibson wrote:
> Hi,
> I've just received an email listing a Linksys Workgroup Gigabit Switch 
> - 8 port for A$291.67 !!
> Every other 8 port Gigabit switch I've seen starts at about A$1,200 
> and a "reputable" brand like Netgear is over A$2,000!
> Has anyone had any experience with these switches?
> Either this is "too good to be true" or a great deal!

Sounds like one of those "specs will get ya" things. Usually cheap 
switches are hamstrung by their internal maximum speed with *all* ports 
active. That's why a good 24 port switch can be $200 bucks, or $2000...

Let me put it this way:
Cheapie 8 port switch, 1000Mb: You can get 1000Mb from any one port to 
another. With all ports active, you may only get 125 Mb-250Mb between 
each port.
Expensive  8 port switch, 1000Mb: You can get 1000Mb from any one port 
to another. With all ports active, you still get 1000 Mb between each 
port.

Since it's aimed at 'workgroups', it's probably not designed for 
constant activity on all ports. It's designed for bursting on different 
ports, with people rarely bursting all at once. Depending on your 
workflow, this may or may not be a bad thing. :-) I've seen prepress 
workflows with constant activity on almost all ports, and ones that are 
strictly low-bandwidth until spooler/RIP (where activity was almost 
constant). Same goes for music, rendering, etc....

-Bop