16 May, 2017

Lightning deal makes me change my plans.

So long story short, while not an Amazon lightning deal, one from a different vendor, but same similar idea. Short time listing at a radically reduced price. Long story short. For the price of the 24 port switch, I got a 24 port, AND a 16 port switch to upgrade my home network and iSCSI SAN.

So what exactly is happening?

Well, In my design for the new network, yes I have a lot of ports / runs that will be unused, but I wanted the flexibility of having lots of ports everywhere I could use them. Which meant that with my design, for the runs, the port usage was going to exceed the capacity of the 16 port main switch very quickly. Especially once we finish the remodel and equip the rooms with the Smart TVs and Android TV boxes. Mind you, not expensive ones, think like Walmart Smart TVs....

I have non related systems that I want to tie in without using a seaparate switch, so... When I saw the deal on the 24 port switch come up, I put it in my shopping cart. With less than an hour to go, the 16 port model came up and in the cart it went, and I clicked check out made my purchase...

I stayed with TrendNet as I have gotten very good service out of the gear they have, and with the limited lifetime warranty they offer, I have peace of mind with it, no problem. The feature set of the 24 port was ideal, complete with rack mount brackets.That is the TrendNet TEG-S24G.

The 16 port is the same model as my pre existing main switch, a TrendNet TEG-S16DG, and is as feature rich, and lacks the one feature that bothers me about original which is they do not include rack mount brackets with the DG models, but you must purchase them separately at a price ranging from $8.00 to $24.00 depending on the source.

With the original TEG-S16DG taken out of use as the main switch and replaced with the 24 port, TEG-S24G swapped in, it was a simple choice to add the second TEG-S16DG, and grab the ETH-11MK rack mount kit. This gives me the advantages of doubling the port capacity on my iSCSI SAN, and the added ability to rack mount the switches instead of just resting them on a cantilever rack shelf, and in no small part, I eliminate 2 external power supplies and replace them with internal power supplied units.

I now have the port capacity to supply wired ethernet everywhere I could possibly want, in quantities I want in the house, even multiple runs into the garage workshop. The gigabit speeds are plenty fast, even for the virtualization cluster.

See the video for unboxing and prepping the TEG-S24G for mounting in the rack.


And the video for unboxing the TEG-S16DG.




No comments:

Post a Comment