Network Communications News (NCN) June 2017 | Page 34

SWITCHES & ROUTERS wireless access points (APs) since they banish the need for separate power facilities and offer greater network flexibility. Don’t forget its routing table capabilities. Most L2 Switches from vendors display the MAC address table size. The MAC address table size is a reference to the maximum amount of network device addresses (noted by their MAC address) that can be stored in the switch at any one time. The bigger the MAC address table, the more capable the switch in larger IT environments which usually have many thousands of network (IP) devices such as printer servers, IP cameras, scanners and enclosure monitoring systems. Management of the switch at this level will probably be pretty basic, but easier for the inexperienced user to manage. Features like ‘web based’ or ‘WebSmart’ switches allow any suitable web browser to login to the switch remotely based on its IP address. Information such as connected ports, speeds and overall performance statistics can be retrieved which should help any SME network. Hardware failure is something at this level that should also be factored into. Some notable vendors offer lifetime support on the switch products. Check to make sure if it includes the all important Power Supply – these are the areas which normally fail on a Switch. If your location suffers from irregular power issues this may shorten the lifespan of the devices, so in the first instance check if the power supplies are covered and then invest in power protection, courtesy of a UPS specifically the Rackmount versions which mount in the enclosure with the active devices. Engage Warp Speed – The Enterprise Network fabric Factoring in design criteria for enterprise and large scale business networks of around 200+ users requires care in planning. Catering for the networking devices alone (such as switches, routers, firewalls and UPS) will make a dent in even the most affluent IT budgets. Key vendors in the realms of large scale and ISP switch and routing deployment play a major role in effective network infrastructures. Although not a primary concern it maybe beneficial for any integrator to offer a single vendor solution for the network. The reasoning for this is borne out by having a single maintenance policy for the site from a single vendor, for cross- equipment compatibility which may have a direct correlation on performance and finally configuration and support of the devices using a common inter face and command structure. But what of the switches and routers on offer at this level? Almost all types offer a vast array of features that if correctly implemented offer superior performance and redundancy, albeit with possibly added complexity of design and configuration. Moving from Layer 2 from the SME installations, we now move onto ‘wire-speed’ Layer 3 devices ‘Networks have come a long way since the advent of TCP/IP in the late 1960s.’ which are effectively a marketing term for a router that is optimised for Ethernet Inter faces. Offering a mixed media approach with some models having port expansion via a common blade chassis with redundant power supplies to warrant maximum uptime. Performance on this level is based on the huge number of Packets Per Second (PPS) that the switch can forward within minimal error loss, advanced on-board CPUs which further reduce network overhead under heavy loads and copper and fibre network ports. Enterprise networks have their own applications that differ from smaller installations. Maybe group video conferencing to a remote geographic region is employed? L3 Switches allow functionality called ‘multicasting’ which reduces overall network traffic by delivering specific network traffic (i.e. video streaming) to specific groups only. L2 switches would potentially flood the network to all devices and cause major performance concerns. Port aggregation is another area which would benefit both from a performance point of view and also from disaster recovery. The Future Networks have come a long way since the advent of TCP/IP in the late 1960s. Converged technologies have put increasing pressures not only on the customer’s network infrastructure but also the underlying technology itself, notably TCP/IP. Running out of IP addresses (under IPv4) has been addressed under the newly adopted IPv6 protocol which allows an almost unlimited amount of IP devices to be connected. By allowing an almost limitless amount of devices to be connected introduces its own performance and security concerns. By adopting new, higher performance switching and routing devices using high density transistor fabrication techniques coupled with emerging technologies such as quantum mechanics and parallel processing, the days with unlimited bandwidth and totally self-healing networks won’t be just for the realms of science fiction. For further information visit: www.dynamode.com 34 | June 2017