Looking for rackmount switch

jgreco

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I looked at the 5524, but I'm scared of the fan. These are almost always like a little Boeing.

Actually the most annoying bit is that in a sufficiently cool environment, it'll cycle the fans on and off as needed. Also, you usually can't replace the fans in these things with arbitrary 40MM fans, because a lot of them have the third wire as rotor lock instead of the fairly common tach found on PC fans.

I've currently got some 8024F's apart here to see if I can reverse their airflow ("unsupported configuration"). Fans are annoying but necessary to the longevity of your gear. :smile:
 

Octopuss

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Actually the most annoying bit is that in a sufficiently cool environment, it'll cycle the fans on and off as needed. Also, you usually can't replace the fans in these things with arbitrary 40MM fans, because a lot of them have the third wire as rotor lock instead of the fairly common tach found on PC fans.

I've currently got some 8024F's apart here to see if I can reverse their airflow ("unsupported configuration"). Fans are annoying but necessary to the longevity of your gear. :)
How about this though?
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Quiet-vers...ct-5524P-5548-5548P-18dBA-noise-/202149648278
(I'd get the P variant if I was to buy on of these switches)
 

jgreco

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How about this though?
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Quiet-vers...ct-5524P-5548-5548P-18dBA-noise-/202149648278
(I'd get the P variant if I was to buy on of these switches)

You mean the ones I quoted a few messages back?

The Dell 5524P hits all your points except fanless/noiseless, which is going to be wicked hard to find in a PoE switch handling more than a few ports. You can find replacement fans on eBay that claim to reduce the fan noise. These are awesome at the price.

With the caveat that you probably need to verify that the fans support rotor lock when you get them (just look up the part number), I'd expect that they're fine.


Possibly. Our networks here are far too complex to be configured on a web managed switch so I typically avoid them, and I'm not a fan of suggesting things unless either I've tried it myself, or someone I trust has. I don't see any obvious reason to think it'd be bad though.
 

Octopuss

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Heh, you're right. I'm lost in links I went throught over the past few days.
I'm thinking about D-Link DGS-1510-20 again. A review claims 44dB noise, so that one seems to be out of question too. That sucks.

The other complication is that the larger enterprise-like switches are pretty power hungry, so I'm starting to feel like in a dead end here.
 

Octopuss

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I still can't get any meaningful info about the noise levels of "plain" 5524, so I'm afraid to just blinly order something. 5524P seems to have 60W or so idle consumption on top of that without anything connected, so I think I need to look elsewhere.

The 1124T looks decent, even though it's not SO cheap when it comes to features, compared to say the 5500 series. I don't need that stuff though, so maybe I shouldn't even look.
 

danb35

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You can find replacement fans on eBay that claim to reduce the fan noise.
I had high hopes for these fans, as my 5524P is quite a bit noisier than my 5524 had been. They shipped quickly, installed without issue, and (as promised) don't throw any errors on the box. Unfortunately, it turns out most of the noise is coming from the power supply, at least in my application. Bother.
 

jgreco

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I had high hopes for these fans, as my 5524P is quite a bit noisier than my 5524 had been. They shipped quickly, installed without issue, and (as promised) don't throw any errors on the box. Unfortunately, it turns out most of the noise is coming from the power supply, at least in my application. Bother.

Sorry. :-(

Which is why I did say "claim".

I do actually have a 5524P sitting waiting for processing in the shop, maybe I can take a peek and see what the situation is.
 

Octopuss

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Looks like I'll keep an eye out for ICX 6450-24p.
 

danb35

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I do actually have a 5524P sitting waiting for processing in the shop, maybe I can take a peek and see what the situation is.
I'd be interested if you could find anything, though it isn't too critical. The switch is in the closet that used to be occupied by my server rack. With that rack in there burning ~1 kW, I had to keep the door open or everything would overheat. But if it's only the switch and a few other odds and ends, I can close the door and it isn't really a problem--though it would always be nice if it were quieter.

For anyone else who might buy those fans, a note to consider: they ship with what look like extensions for the leads, and I was able to fit one fan in without using it. Then I looked more closely at the "extension" and realized it was actually an adapter--the wires change positions from one end to the next. So if you're going to be using one of these, you need to use the "extension" even if the factory wire on the fan is long enough.
 

jgreco

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No doubt! One of the other things that people frequently don't realize is that injectors have a different cable plant dependency. With a PoE switch, the power is on the regular TX/RX pairs so only 2 pair are actually required. With an injector, the power is on the two off pair so all 4 pair are required. If you have someplace where the extra 2 pair have been nabbed to add a jack without pulling extra cable, you are hosed!

Well that's true for 100Mbps, but gigabit does its trick on all four pairs, and does so bidirectionally, with 4D-PAM5 modulation encoding. Of course there's still a lot of 100Mbps crap out there.
 
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Well that's true for 100Mbps, but gigabit does its trick on all four pairs, and does so bidirectionally, with 4D-PAM5 modulation encoding.
Wow, color me silly! I didn't realize that gigabit required all 4 pair. I am embarrassed because I certainly should have known that. Then again, I rarely get directly involved in cable plant anymore. A benefit of gray hairs, I guess.
 

jgreco

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Wow, color me silly! I didn't realize that gigabit required all 4 pair. I am embarrassed because I certainly should have known that. Then again, I rarely get directly involved in cable plant any more. A benefit of gray hairs, I guess.

I like to teach someone something every day, so now I am happy. ;-)
 
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