Recommend a gigabit switch and NAS box?

[Fat Tone]

I have two machines at home that would benefit from a gigibit connection, and my router is out of ports. Any good experiences of gigbit switches (at home prices)?

Also I need a NAS box. I have previously used a Buffalo Terrastation Pro II, but I can't say I'm impressed with reliability and there are 'issues' with it. This one is for disk-to-disk backup of a SBS 2K3 machine. Any thoughts on alternatives?

TIA.

[VJ]

My brother has bought a ReadyNAS, but we haven't configured it yet. The reason he went for ReadyNAS is that it supports many server protocols (e.g. slimserver for driving squeezeboxes). His goal is to setup a music system using a ReadyNAS and a number of Squeezeboxes coupled with active speakers throughout the house (without having a computer connected).

(ReadyNAS is by Infrant Technologies, but they recently have been bought by Netgear... don't know yet if that is a good thing or a bad thing)

Jörg

[Fat Tone]

Thanks Jorg. I think I should stick with something that is RAID with user replaceable drives, which was why I went for the Terastation Pro II before. If it didn't need frequent reboots and if it did handle access permissions reliably* then I'd get another.

*say you create a general purpose share, and then a share for each user account (users created on the box), windows can't cope with more than one authentication. There is supposedly a workaround that lets you authenticate with the credentials on the box but it doesn't work. And the last firmware update has naused up network browsing. The only way to discover shares is to use their utility.

[BarryS]

http://www.thecus.com/news_contentx.php?nid=129

[VJ]

They have indeed an option for some custom form of RAID, but the ReadyNAS can be configured for standard RAID levels and has user-replacable drives (in hotswap cages).
(but as I said, I haven't worked with it)

Jörg

[degrub]

REadyNAS NV+ populate it with drives of your choice that are listed on the website. i have raptor 150s at the moment in raid 5
Linksys gigabit switch SRW2008. Can set up level 2 virtual lans to isolate traffic. Supports jumbo frames. ( although the NV+ didn't when i bought it. It may now). i think there is a 4 port version with slightly lower throughput as well.

Been using both for about 4-5 months now. Quite decent. 3 machines cabled in at gig. 1 WAP, 1 print server, 1 ReadyNAS NV+, 1 linksys rvs 4000 Nat router/switch/FW

[Chucky Cheese]

i have the linksys rvs4000 home security router(..4 port +WAN), i like it because the IPS is upgradeable. i also have the linksys efg250 nas...it is kind of old though, i have it maxed it out with 2 250GB drives...it is still very useful though.

cc

[Jammrock]

REadyNAS NV+ populate it with drives of your choice that are listed on the website. i have raptor 150s at the moment in raid 5
Linksys gigabit switch SRW2008. Can set up level 2 virtual lans to isolate traffic. Supports jumbo frames. ( although the NV+ didn't when i bought it. It may now). i think there is a 4 port version with slightly lower throughput as well.

Been using both for about 4-5 months now. Quite decent. 3 machines cabled in at gig. 1 WAP, 1 print server, 1 ReadyNAS NV+, 1 linksys rvs 4000 Nat router/switch/FW

http://www.infrant.com/products/products_details.php?name=ReadyNAS%20NVPlus

The product details now say Jumbo packet support, so my guess is you need a firmware update to get that working.

Are the Linksys business switches any good? I know their old, cheap workstation/home switches were slow compared to the likes of Netgear and Dlink because they lacked any packet buffer and had a relatively slow backplane. Now that they have been owned by Cisco for a few year I would hope they have caught up on the low to middle end market.

Jammrock

[Helevitia]

I have two machines at home that would benefit from a gigibit connection, and my router is out of ports. Any good experiences of gigbit switches (at home prices)?

Also I need a NAS box. I have previously used a Buffalo Terrastation Pro II, but I can't say I'm impressed with reliability and there are 'issues' with it. This one is for disk-to-disk backup of a SBS 2K3 machine. Any thoughts on alternatives?

TIA.

I also had this same problem a year ago. I was using a 100Mb/s NAS and was disappointed in performance and it was ridden with bugs. After much research, I went with a Linksys SRW2008 8-port gigabit switch non-blocking switch(non-blocking means that it can do full line rate on every port at the same time). I paired that with a Infrant ReadyNAS NV. I then enabled jumbo frames on my NIC, switch and NAS(improves performance about ~5%).

With this setup, I get about 24-29MB(bytes) read and about 18-23MB write. The NAS is still the bottleneck in this case.

A couple of other things worth mentioning, the SRW2008 comes in POE flavor, but I don't have any POE devices at home and I didn't think I would have any in the near future, plus the POE version comes with a fan and I didn't want the noise, so something to keep in mind.

I think there are some newer NAS's on the market that may have faster throughput, but I'm not sure of the reliability. Most everyone says they are happy with the NV because it is stable and supports everything such as NFS, CIFS, whatever apple calls there's, and more. I also use it as a print server and I have two more USB HDD connected to it since it has 3 USB ports.

Let me know if you have anymore questions

Forgot to mention, the switch is about ~$250 and supports every feature you could imagine and tons you probably never heard of. I use it to limit my son's up/down bandwidth. The POE version is about ~$100 more.

[Fat Tone]

Thanks Guys. As to the switch, all I need is a few extra ports, and gigabit would be nice. I already have a wireless router in place (although it was dead this morning...mains adaptor was cold so I'll replace that tonight and should be back in business). I think the devices mentioned above are probably overkil for my needs. I see Dabs has a few simple switches from the big names for under £40 which is what I'd rather pay right now unless it was going to be a mistake.
Options include NetGear GS105, £29, D-Link DGS-1005D £25, 3Com 8-port £37. NetGear GS108UK £52.

I'll look more closely at the NAS suggestions later, cheers.

[Wombat]

The Netgear worked okay at my last job (we needed a few 8-port Gb switches for testing). Had somewhat better throughput with the Linksys.

[Technoid]

just don't go near the Netgear Prosafe GS105 gigabitswitch!

It is a POS!

Mine is a lemon, the one we got at work is marginally better, it doesn't hang in the same way :\

Ive replaced it with (of all things) a 3com plastic switch that has (2+ months) never had any hiccups.

50MBps (sustained until the hdds couldn't keep up) where my netgear never made it over 40 for extended times without crashing and bumping all the computers down to 100mbits.
The one at work don't hang but it only gives us 10-20mbyte through.

Well, it's all my fault for buying the cheapest available one
Funny thing is that the 3com was cheaper than the netgear when I caved in and replaced it

[Fat Tone]

Thanks Technoid. Would that 3Com be the 3CGSU08?

[Technoid]

Thanks Technoid. Would that 3Com be the 3CGSU08?

Almost, I have the 5 port version

Amazing speeds

[Fat Tone]

Ta. Are Zyxel any good? This one is non-blocking and under £40 on offer today: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/produ...oductID=689395