[HamWAN PSDR] Component Engineering: Ethernet Switch - 8 port

[Bart Kus]

Dear Ben-Jammin',

So you might recall our recent discussion where you weighed in favor of 
putting "real" switches into the cell sites to tie the radios together.  
My major pushback to you was the price of a typical Cisco/etc switch.

Well, I've updated the "Ethernet Switch - 8 port 
<https://www.hamwan.org/t/tiki-index.php?page=Ethernet+Switch+-+8+port&structure=HamWAN>" 
page with 3 new alternatives!  They're a miniscule amount of money more 
than the D-Link smart switch, and are in fact full blown RouterOS 
routers.  They also feature 2 more ports (10 total) than the 8-port 
requirement, but the catch is only 5 of the ports are GigE.  This might 
be OK since all the 5SHPn radios are 100Mbit only.  The GigE requirement 
was for future-proofing only.

The other super nice thing is they can do MPLS-TE and preserve QoS. This 
might simplify the network structure a lot by moving routing off of the 
modems and into these routers.  Instead of 7 linked routers at a busy 
cell site, we'd have 1.  The routing tables get a lot easier.  These 
routers also have more routing horsepower than what's in the modems.  
Especially the $105 model, which features a faster CPU and twice the RAM.

2 of the 3 are also rack-mountable, which might be a good thing in most 
sites.

Finally, the idea of using a single OS for all networking is appealing.  
No need for fragmented administrator education, and all the gear is 
designed to work together.

Let me know what you think.  I'm kinda psyched about this approach. I 
ordered a RB2011UAS-2HnD-IN for my personal home use to replace my 
AP+router here.  We'll see how it works out here.

--Bart

RB2011UAS2HnDIN
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