48 port Switch vs 24, 16, 8 etc.

[Sarge76]

Greetings all,

Over the years ive used switches of multiple capacities....from 8 to 48(in a centralized rack system). Its been disappointing to have some of the ports stop working on my 48 port switch. Unplugging it and sending off to repair is way more involved than if i would have stuck with multiples of smaller capacity switches.

Im hoping to get your opinion on a long term solution. Ports inevitably go bad. So how do i get around having a messy rack with multiple switches. Perhaps im missing something and breaking the ports myself? Not sure how i could be at fault but you never know.

The rack system is for home use. It has a dedicated electrical circuit with a surge protected outlet. A rack mounted ups is plugged to said outlet distributes power. The rack houses the ISP router/moden, switches, NAS, and cooling fans. (PS all Ethernet connected devices & ISP feed are also protected by UPS)

Would be great to hear your thoughts, opinions & Solutions.
Thanks
Sgt 76

 

[OzarkEdge]

Greetings all,

Over the years ive used switches of multiple capacities....from 8 to 48(in a centralized rack system). Its been disappointing to have some of the ports stop working on my 48 port switch. Unplugging it and sending off to repair is way more involved than if i would have stuck with multiples of smaller capacity switches.

Im hoping to get your opinion on a long term solution. Ports inevitably go bad. So how do i get around having a messy rack with multiple switches. Perhaps im missing something and breaking the ports myself? Not sure how i could be at fault but you never know.

The rack system is for home use. It has a dedicated electrical circuit with a surge protected outlet. A rack mounted ups is plugged to said outlet distributes power. The rack houses the ISP router/moden, switches, NAS, and cooling fans. (PS all Ethernet connected devices & ISP feed are also protected by UPS)

Would be great to hear your thoughts, opinions & Solutions.
Thanks
Sgt 76

If you need a 48-port switch, you should probably have a spare for it.

OE

 

[microchip]

You must be a really unlucky chap. I've been rocking multiple switches, from small to big ones, for many many years all still in production and not even one of them has developed bad ports yet.

 

[Tech9]

I had one damaged by lightning. This 48-port switch is unlikely needed for home setup. @Sarge76 perhaps plays with "home lab" setup and something faulty on the network or around power supplies damages the switch ports. The switch is not the issue. Ports don't go bad easily.

 

[follower]

Greetings all,

Over the years ive used switches of multiple capacities....from 8 to 48(in a centralized rack system). Its been disappointing to have some of the ports stop working on my 48 port switch. Unplugging it and sending off to repair is way more involved than if i would have stuck with multiples of smaller capacity switches.

Im hoping to get your opinion on a long term solution. Ports inevitably go bad. So how do i get around having a messy rack with multiple switches. Perhaps im missing something and breaking the ports myself? Not sure how i could be at fault but you never know.

The rack system is for home use. It has a dedicated electrical circuit with a surge protected outlet. A rack mounted ups is plugged to said outlet distributes power. The rack houses the ISP router/moden, switches, NAS, and cooling fans. (PS all Ethernet connected devices & ISP feed are also protected by UPS)

Would be great to hear your thoughts, opinions & Solutions.
Thanks
Sgt 76

Do you use PoE?

 

[eightiescalling]

Must admit, while my home usage is way below many (including yours) I've never had problems with ports going bad - cables and connectors yes but not ports.

When considering switch sizes though the answer will depend on the topology you're trying to run. Do you prefer bigger switches because it's all in one place? Do you have chunks of kit that could comfortably be on their own smaller switch? Any sort of segregation you're trying to do? Do you have some sort of latency requirement that means daisy chaining multiple switches would back fire?

Multiple switches isn't a bad thing (any data centre setup wanting high network resilience on a rack will have at least 2 for the rack) or even inherently messy (multiple switches split across a rack can make cable management tidier depend on rack usage) but it depends on the setup and reasons.

 

[sfx2000]

I would do two 24-ports for top of rack... again, that depends on how much connectivity is needed inside the rack - a single 24 might be good enough.

I see 48-port switches occasionally, but not very common outside of the data center as per port they tend to be more expensive than 24-port (typically 3x the cost, e.g. 300 for a 48-port, 100 for a 24 port unmanaged gigabit switch).

 

[ddaenen1]

I honestly never had even one port going bad, not on the Netgear 24 and 52 ports switches i had nor on the Cisco 24p i have now. I do have a UPS in between which might help with avoid influences from the grid.