Switch randomly drops connection to port

How are these switches interconnected. Please be specific and provide details. I'm curious if you have a switching loop.

I am sure I do not have a switching loop. All the littl swiches are plugge into the netgear and PCs and that is it. No little switches are plugged into multiple drops or other switches.

Netgear ----- Dynex Switch in Conference Room ------PCs | -------Dynex Switch in Warehouse ----- 2 PCs (since been removed since the software transition is complete, same issue until I moved to different port on the Netgear)

Thanks so much for the response.

Also when I log into the web interface of the switch, the ports having problems are showing packets sent but none or almost none received. They show no errors though.

For instance: port tx rx tx-errors rx-errors

36 698688 0 0 0

THanks for any suggestions.

Okay, some more information. I just swapped the warehouse PC from the port that is working (changed it to earlier), port 45 back to its original port that was not working port 39. It did not work. Received an IP, but could not go anywhere or ping anything except the loopback. Here is information for both the working (45) and not working (39) ports.

39 Auto On Down

Oh and not sure if this will help but the switch is firmware V1.1.2_05.

2 more ports have mysteriously gone down now. One of them hooked to a printer. So I submitted a print job and monitored the ports traffic. The sending traffic increased as I submitted the print job but the receiving did not. I am not sure if this helps anything. No errors listed.

I find it hard to believe that they would send me a switch to replace a faulty switch with another faulty switch (possible but is it really likely??) so I feel like there must be something else.

If it is another faulty switch, then I need to know for sure bc then I will go to my folks who decide how much money I can spend and tell them that I absolutely need something better.

Thanks for any help.

It appears I am the only one on the board at the moment :)

I looked over my notes, and, for whatever its worth, the replacement switch has the exact same ports not working as the previous switch (and before you ask, I did not mix them up, the new one doesnt have our company asset tag on it yet).

Ports 33-35-36-37-39-45

THanks

It's Netgear. They'll happily send you a dozen faulty switches in a row, rather than admit that there might be a fatal firmware or design flaw.

Netgear has a "Exchanges only, No Returns" policy, by the way, so if it was a known product flaw fixed in another switch model, you wouldn't even be able to get them to trade to the other model. After all, you didn't buy the switch from Netgear, you bought it from a dealer, so Netgear considers this kind of thing to be the dealer's problem.

That said, what you describe does not sound familiar to me.

Is there someone who could lend you a switch for a few days for testing?

This is a newsgroup not a board. Many Gooogle Groups users seem unaware of this distinction. Newsgroups have existed for decades prior to the creation of the Google Groups interface. Newsgroup conversations don't depend on people being "on" at the same time.

I find it best to allow up to two days for a good answer in newsgroups. Don't forget about propagation delays and timezones.

suggests how to get a faster response.

I don't know how much your hourly rate is or how much time you've spent on this but $1700 for a Catalyst switch may be a cheaper solution.

I'm no expert in this area but now that I've commented I feel compelled to throw in a few thoughts ...

Since your Netgear switch is a smart switch, what is it's management interface telling you about the state of the ports which have the problem?

Have you used a network sniffer to view the traffic to a problem port?

Just my $0.02 worth.

Yes I did sniff on a port that was not working. I can see everything getting to the server, and I can see the server responding to the request, but none of the responses make it back to the PC in question. There are zero responses making it to the PC yet I can see that the server is responding. I switch to a working port, resposes show up and everything is working fine.

The management interface reports no errors. On the ports not working, it shows information sent, but little to none receieved. On the ports that are working, shows sent and received fine.

Thanks for your responses. This has been very frustrating.

Thanks.

All right I am done with this netgear switch. I am buying a Cisco switch. I would like full functionality since I am putting the money into it, I need 48 10/100 ports and 2 10/100/1000 ports (atleast). I do not need any fiber or anything. Would a 2960 suffice? Did that replace the 2950's?

Thanks so much for your advice.

I am looking at a Cisco Catalyst 2960-48TT 48 port Switch. Can I log into the CLI to configre VLANs, trunking, STP, VTP, etc?

Thanks.

Yes, definitely. That's a fully managed switch complete with the traditional IOS interface. (Someone told me that the graphic interface is also fairly good.)

If you are going to be purchasing with the VLAN and QoS features in mind, then you should start thinking about which device would be doing the VLAN to VLAN routing. You mentioned that you have an ASA; that should be able to do it (provided it is at least a 5510 with advanced image). But when you only have one of these devices in the network, it can be a tough decision between the 29x0 layer 2+ devices and the 3550 or 3750 layer 3+ devices.

Check your cabling end 2 end and RJ45 connectors.

t0

Just to follow up, I received my Cisco switch, swapped it out, and all problems disappeared. Response times are faster than they ever were with the Netgear, even when it was "working"

Thanks to everyone for your responses.