[NTLUG:Discuss] Router or switch?

[severian@pobox.com]

Howdy,
   I have a $20 Skylink and a $30 SMC switch.  They are both 8 port N-Way 
switches and I have verified that they can route traffic simultaneously on 
multiple pairs of ports without drpping the speed.  I had 6 machines 
involved in each test, with 3 pairs of machines doing a gigabyte or more 
ftp transfer at one time.  If I wanted to more fully test, I should have 
done 4 pairs, but some of my machinnes have small hard drives and I thought 
3 pair was enough to prove the concept.  Some NICS seem to feed the traffic 
better than others(my fastest are Intel), but I see up to 80 Mbits or so 
sustained traffic on multiples transmissions.  The total is clearly more 
that 100 Mbit and I can say that they really are N-Way switches, as 
advertised.  Now I don't say all cheap switches can do this.  I had a 
Linksys that failed miserably to keep up with the others and I retired 
it.  But some cheap switches are great.  The only thing they don't have is 
manageability which I can live without.  And I can't tell you offhand if 
any of mine have the Auto-Mdix.  The only thing that can affect is whether 
you need a crossover cable for the uplink.  Mine either have that or an 
uplink port.
Good day,
Ralph

In response to the welcome remarks of Darin W. Smith at 08:08 AM 5/6/03 -0500:

>You are correct about this.  Cheapo switches won't support 100Mbit going 
>on all ports simultaneously.