[AusNOG] Low cost 10G SFP+ switches?

[Ben]

I was holding off mentioning it - but with those prices, ... and to get 4+ ports for
what sounds like a non-critical system.

Well there is an el-cheapo way.  Stick 3 dual port cards in a pc, then plug onboard
ethernet, or get a cheap intel card into gigabit switch.. then bridge all the ports
together..

Sure there'll be a more latency, and you may struggle to run all the ports at peak
at once, and you have to find motherboard/case/pc that'll take a few PCI-E-e x4 slots..

Mellanox ConnectX-2 EN cards have been cheap on ebay for a while - they generate a lot
of interrupts depending on coalescing settings (which aren't that intelligent) but
single port cards have been going for around $16 US, and dual-port cards for quite a
variable amount.. but "make offer" is your friend. (there's some non-EN ones that have
QSFP, which can run in ethernet mode - but the QSFP to SFP adapters are really expensive,
although curiously QSFP to QSFP cables aren't that expensive for short lengths)

You could also do the ring thing if you're just connecting PC's, ie if you want four
computers with 10GBE, you connect a to b, b to c, c to d, d to a, and route between
them each with dual-port cards.

I'm all ears if there's a cheap 10GBE SFP+ switch though, personally I'd like one that's
fanless for home use :)

Ben.

On Sat, Dec 12, 2015 at 09:33:10PM +1100, Joshua D'Alton wrote:
>    Thanks, the ones with 2 ports are cheap, but to get 4+ is 2k+
>    After lowest total cost for ~4 ports.
>    On Sat, Dec 12, 2015 at 9:15 PM, Joseph Goldman <joe at apcs.com.au> wrote:
> 
>      Look at the mikrotik CRS range, some of them have SFP+, duxtel is a good
>      au disty, or routerboard.com to read up on the models
> 
>      On Sat, Dec 12, 2015 at 9:14 PM, Joshua D'Alton <joshua at railgun.com.au>
>      wrote:
> 
>        Hola list,
>        Cool quiet Saturday night, with a easy question for those already onto
>        the harder stuff...
>        What is available in low cost switches that have SFP+ for 10G? The
>        cheapest I've come up with is a Netgear...$670 24x1g 4xSFP+
>        I feel like there must be other options for either pure or mixed SFP+
>        especially given all the China OEM/whitelabel things floating around
>        DCs these days.
>        Does anyone have a favourite, doesn't need to be DC quality, also
>        doesn't need to be advanced purely for layer2 not even MPLS or VLANs.
>        Oh and doesn't need to have a lot of ports. Looking for lowest TCO,
>        not per port efficiency (where I know you can get for a few k a 48
>        porter from eg Force10 etc).
>        Basically the rasberry pi of SFP+ switching... (hmm is that an option,
>        Rpi with some dodgy chinese SFP+ switching modules soldered on?)
>        Enjoy the beers!
>        --

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