<html><head><style type='text/css'>p { margin: 0; }</style></head><body><div style='font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #000000'>IIRC, there was a company called Catalyst that Cisco bought. CATOS was not native Cisco.<br><br><hr id="zwchr"><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"><b>From: </b>"Chris Gebhardt - VIRTBIZ Internet" <cobaltfacts@virtbiz.com><br><b>To: </b>"BlueOnyx General Mailing List" <blueonyx@mail.blueonyx.it><br><b>Sent: </b>Friday, March 8, 2013 11:56:22 AM<br><b>Subject: </b>[BlueOnyx:12493] Re: Upgrading Switch<br><br>I've been staying away from this thread as long as I could. ;)<br><br>When we built our datacenter and our satellite POPs, we did so with <br>Cisco infrastructure. We come from back in the day when 7507 routers <br>and 5513 switches were state-of-the-art. That's when we first became <br>responsible for managing our own infrastructure. Of course, we have <br>progressed a long way since those times.<br><br>Personally, I can get around in IOS and CatOS. CatOS got a real bad <br>rap, and I think it was a mistake to create something with a different <br>syntax. Obviously, Cisco agreed and later killed CatOS off. But we <br>still have some devices that are running it. We have a handful of <br>Catalyst5505's still doing duty, and they've logged THOUSANDS of days of <br>continuous uptime.<br><br>The "real" Cisco gear works, works well, is utterly reliable and, like <br>it or not, is the industry standard by which all others are judged. <br>You'll always notice that when comparisons are made, it's always with a <br>Cisco as a reference point. I'm not saying there are not other great <br>manufacturers. There certainly are, and other vendors have a bunch of <br>good things that recommend them. But for us, we have no reason to <br>change our infrastructure & network backbone.<br><br>When it comes to making recommendations for customer equipment, I always <br>say you won't be "wrong" for choosing Cisco. That's always a right <br>answer. Not the only right answer, mind you. But you won't be wrong.<br><br>Just make sure that if you do go Cisco, it's "real" Cisco. That <br>Linksys stuff that's branded Cisco... what a mistake that was. Chances <br>are, if your Cisco is blue/green, you're good to go. If it's black, <br>take it back!<br><br>I don't sell the equipment, and I honestly don't have any interest if <br>you buy any particular brand. But if you ask me my experience, and what <br>I see that customers bring in and what works vs. what doesn't? Well, <br>here's a sampling:<br><br>Cisco: If it's "real", it's going to work. We can even help you config it.<br><br>Cisco-branded Linksys: Nope. Not worth it. In my view, it's overpriced <br>junk.<br><br>Juniper: Seems to be solid.<br><br>HP ProCurve: I can count on one finger the problems I have seen with them.<br><br>Dell PowerConnect: Run, do not walk, from this garbage as fast as you <br>can. It has pseudo-management that theoretically allows you to divide <br>into VLANs, but offers no SNMP whatsoever? And no proper CLI? What's <br>up with that? Junk.<br><br>Dell ProConnect: Seems OK for low traffic (ie: anything under 20Mbps to <br>the gateway). Will lock up much past that, and is utterly incapable of <br>handling wirespeed on more than 4 ports.<br><br>Dlink: Surprisingly solid. I had my doubts, and the CLI is a little <br>odd, but I think that's more a matter of familiarity.<br><br>And then there's all the unmanaged stuff. For me, most of that all <br>sort of runs together. We have customers that I know paid $200 for an <br>unmanaged 24-port GigE switch from Netgear or similar, and they're only <br>using 4 ports. We've put in off-brand 5-port GigE switches that cost <br>less than $40 for other customers and they've gotten the same kind of <br>results.<br><br>As far as the OP's question goes, you can find some Cisco 3550's for not <br>a lot of money on ebay these days. And 2924's are practically free <br>these days. Yes, they're old, but they'll still be running after I'm <br>gone from this Earth. I'd probably head in one of those directions.<br><br>-- <br>Chris Gebhardt<br>VIRTBIZ Internet Services<br>Access, Web Hosting, Colocation, Dedicated<br>www.virtbiz.com | toll-free (866) 4 VIRTBIZ<br>_______________________________________________<br>Blueonyx mailing list<br>Blueonyx@mail.blueonyx.it<br>http://mail.blueonyx.it/mailman/listinfo/blueonyx<br></div><br></div></body></html>