A Closer Look at HP ProCurve 2910al-24G Switch (J9145A)

Today, big data centers are upgraded from 10G to 40G or 100G, and some small homelabs migrate from 1G to 10G. For some small business data center, 24 port switch is enough. The switches produced by HP are popular with many data center designers for the high quality and low price. The HP ProCurve 2910al-24G Switch (J9145A) is highly recommended in many forums. This article will guide you to have a closer look at HP ProCurve 2910al-24G Switch (J9145A) switch.

Overview

The HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switch (J9145A) is a 24 port switch that can be used to build high-performance switched network. It offers low latency for high-speed networking. For port configuration, it has twenty 10/100/1000 ports, four dual-personality ports, one RJ45 serial console port and four 10G ports. The HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switch can provide the most flexible and easy-to-deploy uplinks in its class. It can be deployed at enterprise edge and remote branch offices, converged networks, and data center top of rack.

Applications of HP ProCurve 2910al-24G Switch

This part will give a detailed introduction to the network ports on HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switch and cabling solutions for the switch.

Ports on HP ProCurve 2910al-24G Switch

• Twenty 10/100/1000 ports: All these ports have the “Auto MDIX” feature, which means you can use either straight-through or crossover twisted-pair cables to connect any network devices to the switch.
• Four dual-personality ports: Each port can be used as either an RJ45 10/100/1000 port or as a mini-GBIC slot for use with mini-GBIC transceivers. By default, the RJ45 connectors are enabled. If a mini-GBIC is installed in a slot, it is enabled and the associated RJ45 connector is disabled and cannot be used. If the mini-GBIC is removed, the associated RJ45 port is automatically re-enabled.
• Four 10G ports: These ports provide connectivity for 10G speed though either copper or fiber optic media.

Cabling Solution

Since HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switch has 10/100/1000 ports, it can be used for 1G to 1G connection. As shown in the following figure, two 1000BASE-SX SFP transceiver modules are respectively plugged into 1G ports on two HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switches. Then these two 1000BASE-SX SFP transceiver modules are connected via a LC multimode fiber optic cable.

Designed with 10G ports, HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switch can realize 10G to 10G connection just like the above 1G connection. Just replace the 1000BASE-SX SFP transceiver module with 10GBASE-SR SFP+ transceiver. Besides, you can also accomplish 10G to 10 connection by using a 10G SFP+ to SFP+ DAC twinax cable. The following figure shows the cabling solution for you.

Conclusion

The HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switch (J9145A) is a high-performance Gigabit Ethernet switch. It is a good selection for small business network deployment. If you need compatible fiber optic transceiver and fiber optic cable for HP ProCurve 2910al-24G switch, you can have a look at FS.COM. The following table shows some compatible optical components.

Originally published at: http://www.fiber-optical-networking.com/a-closer-look-at-hp-procurve-2910al-24g-switch-j9145a.html

TP-Link T1700X-16TS Vs. T1700G-28TQ

Though 40G and 100G have been widely applied in big data center, 10G is still popular with small homelab. Many 10G switches on the market are designed to used with SFP transceiver module and 10G SFP+ transceiver module, while TP-Link has two 10G switches—T1700X-16TS And T1700G-28TQ, which are respectively characterized by 10GBASE-T RJ45 ports or 10/100/1000Mbps RJ45 Ports. This article will make a comparison between them.

Overview of TP-Link T1700X-16TS And T1700G-28TQ

As members of TP-Link’s T1700 Series 10G smart switches, TP-Link T1700X-16TS And T1700G-28TQ are designed to provide increased scalability, higher bandwidth, and enhanced performance. In addition, with physical stacking improving performance and simplifying management, both of them are able to provide reliable, cost-effective and resilient networking solutions for SMBs. As you can see, here are two figures. Figure 1. shows TP-Link T1700X-16TS and Figure 2. shows TP-Link T1700G-28TQ.

Figure 1. TP-Link T1700X-16TS

Figure 2. TP-Link T1700G-28TQ

TP-Link T1700X-16TS Vs. T1700G-28TQ

Similarities

• Both of them support rich L2 features, including 802.1Q VLAN, Port Isolation, Port Mirroring, STP/RSTP/MSTP, Link Aggregation Groups, and 802.3x Flow Control function.
• Both of them support supports L2+ feature static routing, which provides simple network segmentation by routing internal transmissions to make the flow of network traffic more efficient.
• Both of them support IP-MAC-Port Binding, Port Security, Storm control, and DHCP Snooping, which help to protect the network from broadcast storms, ARP attacks, and more.
• Both of them support 802.1X, which allows network clients to be authenticated through external Radius servers and the guest VLAN function allows non-802.1X clients to access specific network resources.
• Both of them utilize rich QoS policies to support voice, data, and video services on one network.
• Both of them support various user-friendly standard management features, such as intuitive web-based Graphical User Interface (GUI), industry-standard Command Line Interface (CLI), SNMP (v1/2/3), and RMON. Therefore, they are easy to use and manage.
• Both of them support Dual Image to provide improved reliability and network uptime.

Differences

• TP-Link T1700X-16TS is equipped with 12 x 10GBASE-T RJ45 ports and 4 x 10G SFP+ ports, providing 320 Gbps switching capacity. While TP-Link T1700G-28TQ is designed with 24 x 1GE ports and 4 x 10G SFP+ ports. As TP-Link T1700G-28TQ supports up to 6 units in a stack, it is able to provide 768 Gbps switching capacity.
• TP-Link T1700X-16TS utilizes 10GBASE-T technology which provides a cost-effective method for migrating from current network to 10G Ethernet by using existing Cat5e/Cat6 short connections (up to 55 meters) and Cat6a/Cat7 connections (up to 100 meters). While with true physical stacking technology, up to six T1700G-28TQ units can be stacked with a single IP address, which provides enhanced scalability, simple management, and increased redundancy for high-density deployment.
• TP-Link T1700X-16TS is a little larger than TP-Link T1700G-28TQ. The size of the former one is 440 x 220 x 44mm, while the latter one is 440 x 180 x 44mm.
• TP-Link T1700X-16TS is designed with two smart fans. While TP-Link T1700G-28TQ utilizes a fanless design, which reduces the amount of ambient noise.
• TP-Link T1700X-16TS can be used with 10GBASE-T copper SFP+ transceiver, 10G SFP+ transceiver and DAC cable. While TP-Link T1700G-28TQ can be used with Ethernet cable, 100/1000BASE-T SFP transceiver, 10G SFP+ transceiver and DAC cable.
• TP-Link T1700X-16TS is more expensive than TP-Link T1700G-28TQ. You can find TP-Link T1700X-16TS at $ 950 US dollars and TP-Link T1700G-28TQ at $ 308 US dollars on Amazon.

Conclusion

From the above comparison, we can find that both TP-Link T1700X-16TS and TP-Link T1700G-28TQ have their own advantages. Before you make a decision, you’d better figure our what you most care about. If you want to use 10GBASE-T copper SFP+ transceiver, you can choose TP-Link T1700X-16TS. But if you want lower budget, then buy TP-Link T1700G-28TQ. FS.COM can provide cost-effective 10GBASE-T copper SFP+ transceiver, Ethernet cable, compatible SFP module, 10G SFP+ transceiver and DAC cable.

Originally published at: http://www.fiber-optical-networking.com/tp-link-t1700x-16ts-vs-t1700g-28tq.html