On Fri 15 Jun 2007 12:55:00 NZST +1200, Nick Rout wrote: > I am out of ports at home on my 8 port switch (don't ask).
Easy: 2 ports per room, extra for the computer room, one for the printer, one for the firewall - oops. > 16 port switches seem disproportionately expensive. $70 instead of 2*$25 - is that worth extra hassle? > Is there a disadvantage in getting another 8 port switch and linking > them together? I know I then end up with 14 ports as opposed to 16 (as > one on each will be taken with the connection). Within a physical network of this size (see other posts), probably no noticable difference. The issue is bandwidth - the data going through each port for the (logical) network connections established at that time. With 2 8-port switches obviously all the data between all computers on one to all computers on the other side has to go through that one cable between the 2 switches. That's 100Mbit total. However, there's a total bandwidth limit per switch (all pots on that) as well. Meaning if you take an 8-port switch and blast away 100Mbit full-duplex between two ports each simultaneously, you won't get 400Mbit full-duplex total through the switch. Not surprisngly, manufacturers don't specify this limit, but expect a correlation with price. Volker -- Volker Kuhlmann is list0570 with the domain in header http://volker.dnsalias.net/ Please do not CC list postings to me.
