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We've been running a 10/100 Ethernet switch in the Automated Home since we moved in nearly 10 years ago. With more devices on the LAN - currently nearing 40 IP address used (see the list below) and with ever larger files moving around our network, the time has come to upgrade to a 10/100/1000 gigabit switch.
Our switch lives in the 19" rack in Node Zero and so we need another rackmount unit to replace the 10/100. Having had good service from the previous Netgear FSM726S and hearing good things about its big brother - the Netgear GS724T we decided to give it a try.The Management - The GS724T has 24 10/100/1000 ports. It's a "Managed" switch meaning it has increased functionality compared with a basic un-managed device. A web-browser interface allows you to monitor switch performance, configure ports, even set up port trunks, VLANs, and traffic prioritization. The Fast and the Furious - At the end of the day what we really want to know is how much faster it is. In our semi-scientific test we copied a 4.7 gigabyte test file across our LAN using the old 10/100 switch first (from a Mac mini to an iMac - both use gigabit NICs) and then the test was repeated once the new switch was installed. As you can see from the graph below, the real world benefits of the upgrade are remarkable. The old switch took 7 miniutes and 8 seconds to copy the file, while the upgrade brought that time down to just 1 minutes and 58 seconds - a 72% improvement. 
Its also worth mentioning that the cabling for our network was installed in our house over 10 years ago and is standard CAT5 (not CAT5e). So, all in all a great result and a really worth while upgrade. Next on the list is to update our JukeBox server to SATA and Gigabit NIC, but that's one for another day. Netgear GS724T : Other Gigabit Switches After posting a quick photo of our newly installed switch on Twiiter a few days ago, some of our followers (follow us at Twitter.com/ottomate) asked what IP devices we used. As promised here's a list of the items currently on our LAN, (we may have missed some that aren't active currently)... - Router
- CCTV Server PC
- Home Automation Server PC
- Jukebox Media Server PC
- Kitchen Mac
- Vista Media Center PC
- Netbook
- Laptop
- Laptop
- Apple TV
- Games Cosole
- Sonos Zone 1
- Sonos Zone 2
- Sonos Zone 3
- Sonos Controller
- IP CCTV Camera 1
- IP CCTV Camera 2
- IP CCTV Camera 3
- Bedside Computer
- AV Room Comuter
- xBox Media Center 1
- xBox Media Center 2
- xBox Media Center 3
- Games Console
- Mobile Phone 1
- Mobile Phone 2
- Mobile Phone 3
- Network Switch
- Apple TimeCapsule (802.11n network)
- Wireless Access Point (802.11a/b/g network)
- Printer
- Wi-Fi Photo Frame
- Keene IR over Ethernet Module 1
- Keene IR over Ethernet Module 2
- Alarm System
- VoIP Phone
Netgear GS724T : Other Gigabit Switches
cabling
diary
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