So just to add here, i looked for a long time to find a dedicated 10Gb switch that wasnt outrageously priced....I work with ALOT of cisco stuff (Cisco 5000 and 7000 series) but new and *if* you can find it used is still $1,000 to $5,000 and well, for a homelab that isnt really acceptable (for most) So instead i went and scoured ebay :) . Heres my findings, my setup WAS a bunch of daisy chained...but realized that at the rate im moving thats unacceptable, so i found a switch, now she isnt new...and she isnt the prettiest of the bunch, but she was affordable and did 10Gb :D
Here's the
10Gb switch i purchased : ~$400 shipped , i figured i can live with that.
The
10Gb XFP's i was able to get from that seller for $20 each (might have been able to go lower...but wasnt too worried)
I already had 4 of the
Chelsio T420-CR cards, but i wanted to include them anyways: ~ managed to get them for $165 each from that seller
And then i got the
SFP+ 's from this seller for $25 each.
10Gb fiber cables: I picked up x8 2M Multimode aqua color
Now all in all, the switch is old yes (2006-2007) But it gets the job done, and gives me a 10Gb backbone for all my stuff, my 2 ESXi servers + my FreeNAS server and my SAN for ESXi storage.
Now i know this kind of setup isnt for everyone...but it might help someone some day lol. Now i will tell you i contact Fujitsu and verified the XFP's i was purchasing were compatible as no where in the hardware manual or there website did it list compatible XFP's....
So yea, thats my story. Dont troll me too much for wanting 10Gb that bad :p