Hubs
Are multi port repeaters of network traffic. So every piece of network traffic it receives it will repeat it to all the devices it's got connected. This can result in a lot of unnecessary traffic being sent to all devices on the network. Not always a massive issue on small network but in the 20 years I've been in the IT game, I've never had good experiences of hubs. The tend to lock up and require resetting regularly. I wouldn't use them for anything critical.
Switches
Switches control the flow of network traffic based on the address information in each packet of data. A switch is generally more intelligent and learns which devices are connected to its ports (by monitoring the packets it receives), and then forwards on packets to the appropriate port only. So rather than it sending the data to everything it knows which device the information is for. Generally speaking the bandwidth available to a device connected to a switch is better because it's not having to deal with all of the other network traffic a hub would be sending to it.
They have one less now...its on its way to me between 6 and 9pm....lolAgree with all of that, plus, in home use I doubt if you would ever tell the difference between being on a gigabit switch or a 100mbit switch. Especially if you are used to WiFi. Most people are using their network to access the Internet via a broadband connect that is usually running at a fraction of a gigabit and a fast switch won't speed that up. If you have a backup to a networked storage device, then I guess you might want to go as fast as possible.
This morning Amazon have 8 port TP-Link and 5 port Netgear switches at £14 and £12 delivered (Prime). Apart from being astonished at how they can be made in China and delivered to my door for that price, I be happy with either.
When you get a NAS save up and get a decent one. I found out mine cant be used as a media server....I got the gigabit one because I was thinking I might get a NAS at some point, good to know it'll make a difference.
I wouldn't bother, to be honest. In real life you're not going to notice any difference.I have been advised that to get best performance i need to set the superhub2 to Bridge settings and use a seperate wifi .
I have been advised that to get best performance i need to set the superhub2 to Bridge settings and use a seperate wifi .
It got here at 8.56...gonna install it in the morning now.They have one less now...its on its way to me between 6 and 9pm....lol
A mate of mine is sorting out a managed wifi switch from the company he trains for. Mikrotik.
https://www.allness.net/?page=training
One thing I discovered was that a lot of the cheap LAN cables are copper-coated aluminium inside. Utter crap stuff, and well worth paying the few pennies extra to get decent all-copper cables.Avoid crushing the cable and sharp cable bends. Either can unbalance the signal lines leading to sufficient loss to slow the connection down.
Net gear switches have a lifetime warranty on them, well the 24 port switches we use do.I bought a used Netgear 16-port GBit switch for 20 quid, on the principle that you can never have too many ports. After re-jigging the layout of my LAN I have ten unused ports on it, but plans afoot will occupy a few more in a little while. The seller threw in another Netgear 16-port 100Mbit switch for free, and even though it's of limited use, it will do as an aggregator for other slower devices. I also have a 24-port Gb switch that only needs its internal PSU sorted out, and I can easily adapt that to wall-wart power, so I'm sorted for a while yet.
I'd been soldiering on with a mish-mash of 100Mbit switches and using old routers as switches and it had ended up being a bit of a git, especially the old routers that were pressed into service as wireless access points and switches - they'd periodically throw a wobbler.
Everything is now clean and fast, and I access the other devices as quick as a wink, now.
One thing I discovered was that a lot of the cheap LAN cables are copper-coated aluminium inside. Utter crap stuff, and well worth paying the few pennies extra to get decent all-copper cables.
Unfortunately, the one with the dud PSU is a D-Link DGS1024G, and the PSU failure is usually a cooked cap or two. Easy fix, from what I can see. It's on the someday, sometime pile.Net gear switches have a lifetime warranty on them, well the 24 port switches we use do.