Yes - when pricing switches, or any sort of (sub-)system, a full
BOM must be used to make a meaningful comparison.
Matt
On Mon, 9 Aug 2010, John Ford wrote:
And don't forget that the switches that are XFP and SFP+ sometimes
(usually?) don't include the optics for each port in the switch price.
With CX4, all you need is a cable, if you're within a few meters.
Yes - that list is years old.
Those Fujitsu and HP switches have been tested with the CASPER hardware
and found to work as advertised.
There are lots of new products available. More announced
all the time. We are in contact with a number of vendors in
hopes of getting demo units to try in house with the CASPER
hardware before listing them as recommended for use.
Our tests will include running at full line rates all ports continuously
as that's what our intended applications require.
Less demanding applications will have many more, and
cheaper, options for suitable switch vendor and model.
I have no prediction for when I will be able to add more switch
models will to that list.
Matt
On Thu, 5 Aug 2010, Andrew Lutomirski wrote:
On Thu, Aug 5, 2010 at 3:21 PM, Matt Dexter <[email protected]>
wrote:
Hi Tom,
were you aware of these ?
http://casper.berkeley.edu/wiki/Recommended_10_GbE_Hardware
Sadly the list is out of date: some of the switches are no longer in
production. The XG700, for example, is great and cheap but you can't
buy one without great difficulty.
I'm not sure that manufacturers really care about CX4 anymore now that
SFP+ parts are available.
--Andy
http://casper.berkeley.edu/wiki/Equipment_Cables
Matt Dexter
On Thu, 5 Aug 2010, Tom Downes wrote:
Casper-folks:
Hoping to short-circuit a fair amount of research here in the hope
that someone has had to do this already. I'll soon be looking to
connect 10-20 ROACH boards by 10 gbe to a data acquisition
computer(s).
It seems like the smartest way of doing that is getting a 16-port
switch or potentially two 8-port switches. But the 10 Gbe port on the
ROACH seems to be CX4 which I take to be a less popular connector
variety.
What kind of switches have ROACH users out there used to connect up a
bunch of boards? Are there switches out there to convert CX4 to
something with a reach longer than the 15m Wikipedia quotes as the
limit of CX4. 15m is very borderline for our needs.
The prices seem to vary widely. We do not need network admin tools or
anything fancy. In fact our data rates could probably go over 10Mb
cabling, but the 10Gbe interface of the ROACH is more convenient from
the firmware perspective. This is more of a multiplexer than a switch.
Tom
