Multiple switches

We have a site that will have upto 80 or so pc's, all cat5e cabling back to 1 rack.

We usually use 2950 switches, upto 48 ports, never used anything larger

- it seems inefficient to link two of these via a 1GB port.

Is there a way to link two or more of these and effectively turn them into 1 switch get full bandwidth) or would we be better off speccing a much larger switch, ive never seen a 96 port in operation but the site is likely to need this many, maybe a few more so trying to work out how best to achieve this.

Although most systems will be new and also have gigabit network cards there is no need for gigabit to the desktop, its mostly standard admin work with fairly small volume small files.

Reply to
jas0n
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Having a look through available cisco switches the Cisco 2980G-A (80

10/100 ports - 2 flexible gigabit) seems an option.

Im not so sure what to consider when moving upto this number of systems

- the servers (likely 2) will be current dual cpu hp dl380's raid, etc with gigabit ports so we may get away with this one device ... although im in 2 minds if its better to have 2 seperate devices in case 1 fails can still have half the network up and running.

Any comments?

Reply to
jas0n

I run 2950s in stacks of 6 without any problems; uplink to my core is

1 GB via fiber and I use gigastacks between the switches themselves. (looped gigastacks run in half duplex) 4000 active ports on the network.

What does your traffic look like? Users to a few servers, users to WAN (internet or private net), users to users? From your description it does not look like the gig uplinks would be a problem.

crt

Reply to
Claude R Trepanier

How is your network utilized? Are you planning on replicating all of your internal services onto both switches? Ie, domain controllers, DNS server, NTP server, file servers, SANs, etc? Are you going to provide

2 separate connections from you Internet router(s) and router terminating WAN links back to both core switches? If not then 2 separate switches really doesn't gain you anything other than added expense and admin overhead.

Has does your network look from a layer-3 perspective? Do you have more than one VLAN? If so are you employing the router on a stick methodology to provide L3 between VLANs?

The most important question of all is do you see your company employing the use of VoIP sometime in the next 4 years? If so then you need to seriously consider buying PoE switches. You will also have to segregate voice and data traffic. A purely L2 core may cause you problems here. You may want to consider the purchase of a larger chassis (4500) with a higher end Supervisor module to do L3 in the core.

There are lots of things to consider beyond the number of ports. I'd recommend calling a local Cisco shop for a network survey. Most will do this for you for free or a discounted rate to seek out job opportunities. Take their input and then begin evaluating your company's position.

J
Reply to
J

if you need more bandwidth between the switches then Cat 3750s are designed for resilient high speed stacking.

They have more features and are more expensive, but should be similar to the

2950s you are used to.
Reply to
stephen

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