[TriLUG] OT - gigabit switches

[Christopher L Merrill]

We would like to upgrade our testlab to a gigabit switch.  I'm not an
expert in this area (I spend most of my time at level 7). Maybe some of
you network gurus can set me straight.

In our lab we'll have 10-25 machines (some with dual NICs) mostly fast
ethernet but we're moving machines to GigE. We currently have a Dell 2324
with 2 GigE ports.  Performance between the machines connected directly
to the switch is the only real goal.  Management functions are not
important, beyond the desire for simple plug-n-play management that we
have today (in other words...no management - just plug them in).  Note
that we do load-testing in the lab, so for a network with only a handful
of machines, they run a LOT of traffic between them - frequently to the
CPU/NIC limit of each machine.

I've read a little on layer-2 and layer-3 switches and think I grasp the
differences, but it is not clear to me if there would be any performance
benefit for US with a layer-3 switch.  Budget is obviously a concern so
a $2000 switch will take some selling.  Under what kind of situations would
we see a difference in the total throughput rates on, for example, a Dell
2724 (layer 2, <$300), a Dell 5324 (layer 2/3, $750) and a 6024 (layer 3,
$2000)???  What about an older Dell 5224 (layer2/3, ebay $300)?  What does
"layer 2/3" mean?

Any recommendations or pointers for some good reading would be much
appreciated.

p.s. We have lots of Linux boxes in the lab  :>

TIA,
C



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Chris Merrill                           |  Web Performance, Inc.
chris at webperformance.com                |  http://webperformance.com
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