Network switch device upgrade and purchase Guide

When the main performance of a LAN cannot meet the new application requirements of an enterprise, you must consider upgrading the network.

During the upgrade, you should analyze the problems to be solved based on the requirements of network applications, especially the upgrade of switch hardware devices. This article will discuss this issue with you.

Upgrade network devices

1. Principles for selecting upgraded network devices

When selecting a network device for a network upgrade, follow these principles:

Reliability

Because the upgrade is often the core and backbone network, its importance is self-evident, and once paralyzed, it will have a huge impact. Therefore, reliability must be put first. Both brand selection and Device Configuration take reliability as the first consideration.

Performance

As a backbone network node, the central switch, aggregation switch, and plant switch must be able to provide fully non-blocking multi-layer switching performance to ensure smooth business.

Manageability

The manageable level of a large network directly affects the operation cost and service quality. Therefore, all nodes should be manageable and a powerful and concise network management system is required, it can comprehensively monitor and manage network traffic and operation status.

Flexibility and scalability

Due to the complex structure of the enterprise network, the switch must be able to connect to a full range of interfaces, such as optical ports and electrical ports, Mbit/s, Gbit/s and 10 Gbit/s ports, multi-mode optical fiber interfaces, and long-distance Single-Mode Optical Fiber interfaces. The switching structure should also be able to flexibly expand the capacity according to the network expansion. Its software should have independent intellectual property rights, and its subsequent R & D and upgrade should be ensured to ensure support for future new businesses.

Security

With the popularization and development of networks, various attacks are also threatening network security. Not only access switches, but also vswitches at the backbone layer should take into account security issues, such as Access Control and bandwidth control, so as to effectively control the infringement of poor services on the entire backbone network.

QoS control capability

With the increasing number of multimedia business flows, such as voice and video on the network, we have put forward higher requirements for core switching nodes, not only can we achieve normal line rate switching, they must also be able to effectively control their priorities and bandwidth based on the characteristics of different business flows, so as to ensure the smoothness of important business and time-sensitive business.

Standard and openness

Because the network is often an environment with multiple manufacturers' devices, the selected devices must be able to support common open standards and protocols in the industry, so that they can communicate effectively with other manufacturers' devices.

Cost effectiveness

On the basis of meeting network requirements and network applications, the cost-effectiveness of equipment should be fully considered to achieve the maximum ROI.

2. Upgrade the switch

Vswitches in an enterprise network are divided into three layers: Core-layer switches, aggregation-layer backbone switches, and access-layer workgroup switches ). As the hub of the entire network, almost 80% of network transmission is completed by the core switch. Therefore, the performance of the core switch determines the performance of the entire network. Therefore, when upgrading the network, you should first consider upgrading the core switch.

3. upgrade from 1g to 1G network

To upgrade a Gigabit Ethernet, you must first upgrade the network backbone. You only need to replace the network center switch from the original Fast Ethernet switch to a Gigabit Ethernet switch to upgrade the network trunk to a gigabit, in this way, the original network performance is comprehensively improved, which is not only easy to invest but also smooth. Then, the connection between the vswitch and the server is upgraded to gigabit, and the communication link from the server to the vswitch is comprehensively upgraded to provide the server with non-blocking, Gigabit line rate switching capability, this laid the foundation for implementing multimedia applications on the network. If the funds permit and there is network demand, the connection between the switch and the workgroup switch can be further improved to build a truly gigabit network.

When upgrading the network to gigabit, you should pay attention to the following issues:

Integrated Wiring Conditions

Gigabit Ethernet refers to the bandwidth of the network trunk. Therefore, the trunk cabling system must meet the requirements of Gigabit Ethernet. Generally, multi-mode optical fiber or single-mode optical fiber is used for cabling between buildings. Because the single-mode optical fiber can well support Gigabit Ethernet, the effective distance of 1000Base-Lx is 2 km, so there is no need to worry about it. However, if the original wiring uses multi-mode optical fiber, you should be careful to confirm. The transmission distance of a 62.5/125 micron multimode optical fiber is 220 meters, and that of a 50/125 micron multimode optical fiber is 550 meters. When the distance is exceeded, re-wiring should be made and replaced with a single-mode optical fiber.

In fact, the transmission distance between a single-mode optical fiber in a dry G network and a 10G network is much longer than that of a Multi-Mode Optical Fiber. Therefore, considering the network upgrade and investment protection, we recommend that you use a single-mode optical fiber cabling system.

For vertical and horizontal cabling systems, if the maximum distance is less than 100 meters, the original cat5e or cat6 cabling system can be used to access a gigabit network with 1000Base-T devices. Multi-mode optical fiber is recommended for the vertical wiring system, and six types of unshielded twisted pair wires are recommended for the horizontal wiring system. It should be noted that although the five-category cable also supports GB, the overall cost of the equipment is too high, rather it is better to re-lay the cat-5e or cat6 cable. In addition, if you need to re-wiring, we recommend that you select Cat 6 for horizontal cabling, multi-mode optical fiber for vertical cabling, and single-mode optical fiber for architectural cabling to ensure the performance of Gigabit Networks, and keep it as appropriate to further improve bandwidth redundancy.

Overall Network Planning

Before upgrading the network, you must plan and design the entire network. That is to say, you must ensure that the switch has a high backboard bandwidth and data throughput to meet the needs of large data forwarding and routing; the server should implement cluster services. Load balancing. Increase the response speed to data requests and reduce customer waiting time. Multiple links should be established between the backbone switch and the central switch to achieve load balancing. Implement data non-blocking transmission. That is to say, the configuration center switch, backbone switch, and server are optimized to avoid possible network bottlenecks, so as to ensure full use of gigabit performance.

4. upgrade from a dummies switch to a smart switch

In addition to core switches, aggregation layer switches and working group switches should also be upgraded from dummies to smart devices.

Aggregation layer switches are placed in buildings with a large number of computers. gigabit network management switches with fixed ports can be used to connect to the core switch Gigabit upwards and bind links to increase bandwidth, load Balancing and link redundancy are achieved. gigabit connections to eight-layer switches are implemented downward to avoid network transmission bottlenecks.

According to statistics, more than 80% of the data traffic in the network is formed by the Internet and access servers. Therefore, the performance of devices at the aggregation layer is particularly important. If a department has a large number of users or frequently accesses a dedicated server, you can also choose a modular layer-3 Switch and set up a dedicated server in this department, to reduce data traffic in the network and improve network transmission efficiency. If the number of computers in a building is small, the aggregation layer switch can be no longer set. Instead, the GBICStack technology is used to stack the access layer switch together and connect to the central switch using the GBIC module.

The access layer switch is placed in a device room on each floor or in a computer set. select a 10/100 Mbit/s Network Management Switch with a gigabit port to achieve Gigabit connection to the aggregation switch, and implement remote monitoring, management, and control of each access port, improves network access security. and manageability of network devices. In some places that do not have high security requirements, you can also use a 10/100 Mbit/s dumb switch to reduce the cost of device purchase. It should be noted that, in order to save communication costs, especially to achieve remote communication with remote companies, we recommend that you select a network management switch that supports VoIP in the office that requires frequent communication.

5. upgrade from a hub to a vswitch

A network composed of HUB) is called a shared network, and a network composed of switches is called a switched network. The main problem with shared Ethernet is that all users share bandwidth. The actual available bandwidth of each user decreases with the increase of the number of users. This is because when the information is busy. multiple users "compete" for one channel at a time, while a channel can only be occupied by one user at a time. therefore, a large number of users are often in monitoring waiting status, resulting in jitter, stagnation or distortion during signal transmission, seriously affecting network performance.

In switched Ethernet, the switch provides a user-specific information channel, unless two source ports attempt to send information to the same destination port at the same time, otherwise, the source port and the target port can communicate with each other at the same time without conflict. The experiment shows that the actual maximum transmission speed of switched Ethernet in full duplex is 3.8 times that of the shared network.

LAN switches will gradually replace hubs. 10/100 Mb/s adaptive switch is a popular network device in the market. It not only improves the overall speed of the network, but also is compatible with the 10 Mb/s device of the original network, seamlessly integrate the old 10 Mbit/s Ethernet device into a 100 Mbit/s broadband Ethernet device. It also lays the foundation for comprehensive upgrade of the 100 Mbit/s network.

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