Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2004 14:19:37 -0800 From: Wes Peters <wes@softweyr.com> To: Bakul Shah <bakul@BitBlocks.com>, "Marc G. Fournier" <scrappy@hub.org> Cc: freebsd-net@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Looking for switch recommendations ... Message-ID: <200403261419.37797.wes@softweyr.com> In-Reply-To: <200403261908.i2QJ8lHA078562@gate.bitblocks.com> References: <200403261908.i2QJ8lHA078562@gate.bitblocks.com>
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On Friday 26 March 2004 11:08 am, Bakul Shah wrote:
> > What is the difference between Layer2 and Layer3, and what does that
> > affect?
>
> Layer3 == routing (based on IP destination address)
> Layer2 == switching (based on enet dest. address)
>
> Layer3 is probably not important for you.
That depends. For a test network, a VLAN-capable Layer3 switch can be quite
a nice tool, because you can partition the switch into 2 or 3 separate
virtual networks without buying a bunch of boxes.
I write this not because I think VLAN switches are a general necessity, but
rather because I have an idea of the kinds of activities Marc gets involved
in, and suspect his networking needs are often far beyond ordinary.
I'm going to add a testimonial for the HP switches here. Given that I'm a
former Xylan/Alcatel employee, this should carry some weight. The Alcatel
architecture is fairly good, but it carries a lot of baggage from the Xylan
"any to any" switching architecture which tends to drive their cost up a
bit. The HP ProCurves perform well and are reliable and (relatively)
cheap.
--
"Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?"
Wes Peters wes@softweyr.com
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