Routers, switches, machine room and lockable racks (was Re: [tech] Switchesu)

[Nick Bannon]

On Wed, Sep 13, 2000 at 05:06:22PM +0800, Grahame Bowland wrote:
[...]
> and having it on non-smelly hardware is a plus. I agree - we should buy 
> something like a slow Celeron and make it the router. I suppose it could 

That sounds good. We can probably do it for a fair bit under $500.
Anything Pentium class would do, but we can't buy a new CPU that
slow. Maybe an AT Super7 MB to fit our rackmount cases, or we could
just go for a desktop ATX. (but the case will cost more)

Fill it with with decent tulips or 3com's. Three or four 10/100Mbps's,
maybe one or two 10Mbps combo cards.

The software configuration is an interesting question, but we're not
there yet.

[...]
> If we can get switches at $200 we may as well get four. That'd free up the 
> big hub in the machine room for use in events whenever we network the loft. 
> We'd also have a faster network.

Not noticably faster in most cases, and we already have a hub
that's movable on demand. Let's get two, more only if they're useful.
Proper rackmount hardware is also worth getting a quote one.

[rack/machine room discussion]

Time to take this to the UCC list, people. I think it's a good idea to
explore, but I'll immediately qualify that with "we're not ready yet -
it's something to consider a year or three down the track", "racks are
very expensive", "one rack is not enough" and "it's a one way trip -
this should NOT happen on a passing whim".

Nick.

-- 
  Nick Bannon  | "I made this letter longer than usual because
nick at it.net.au | I lack the time to make it shorter." - Pascal