Switch advice please - followup

Fri Jul 22 18:39:13 UTC 2005

 Thanks to everyone for their advice and stories. It seems the popular choice
is Cisco with a close second of foundry. Even a nice mention of Dell switches.
 Most people had nothing good to say about HP. (phew..  glad I asked you all) I
completely forgot abt Foundry so they are my next stop!
 Oddly no one mentioned 3com. I don't know if that's good or bad.

 The sad part is I hate Cisco. Well I hate IOS. It is the most counter
intuitive interface known to man. We currently have several 3550's and one that
is still partially brain dis-functional after a "senior network engineer" at a
hosting facility got a-hold of it to "help out".

 To be honest I miss Ascend. Nice interfaces with actual menu's and interface
for those of us who don't need 50 ways to do something or only find they need
to touch their switches once a year for upgrades or whatever. You could at
least wander through the menu's to figure out/remind yourself what to do. 

 If anyone makes a switch with this type of menuing that can actually pass
lots of bits well and is not a consumer toy. I want to know  :)

 Thanks everyone!

  Nicole

>  Hello 
>  I am looking at acquiring some switches to upgrade a large web site front
> and
> back-end switching network.  
> 
>  I am looking at cisco and HP switches at the moment and would like to hear
> peoples opinions on them or recommendations for any others.
> 
>  Some of the switches I am looking at are 24 and 48 Port GB (copper)
> switches
> and 48 and 24 port 10/100 with GB feed's. (one or two feeds)
> 
>  Also if anyone makes a small (like 8 port) GB switch with GB that routes
> fast
> enough to act as a gateway from Gb fiber drop to copper GB feed to other
> switches. Most of the small switches seem underpowered for such a task. Or
> am I
> wrong in this?
>  
> 
>  Thanks so much!
> 
> 
>   Nicole
> 
>  