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Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

code.facebook.com

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Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#21

Post by gonzo »

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #7
rustyconover wrote: post #4

I get the feeling this is a bit like Bugatti building the Veyron, its super cool and impressive but the vast majority of us will never be able to or have a need to drive it. It is still fun watch this switch go around the proverbial track, but I'm happy knowing that I'll never have to configure, build and test a switch of this complexity unless I really absolutely have to, with my largest caveat being AWS disappearin…

You're not the target market. You shouldn't be making an analogy with a Veyron, which remains a luxury car for an individual. You should rather be comparing it with a firetruck, a vehicle custom-built for a purpose you as an individual you will never need. I currently work in the network hardware industry (think Cisco, Juniper, etc). Our boxes sell in the 6-figure price range, each [1]. We sell to your ISP, wireless…

> Individual chips used in the hardware can cost multiple thousands of dollars each.

and 10 years ago, the compute power of a QC i7 would have tens of thousands of dollars.

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#22

Post by mey »

aaronbee wrote: post #5
rsync wrote: post #3

I very much want to transition to open hardware models for networking gear - for both my own home use and for rsync.net. However, at no single site (especially my home) do I need a 6U chassis full of switch ports. Is there a 1U version of this on the horizon ?

Facebook's Wedge 1U switch is what this builds on. https://code.facebook.com/posts/681382905244727/introducing-...

Is anyone building a copy of that to sell to other people besides Facebook?

Similar to how you can buy a Backblaze Pod ( https://www.backblaze.com/blog/backblaze-storage-pod-4/ ) from http://www.45drives.com/

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#23

Post by gh02t »

korethr wrote: post #19

This is rather cool, and I'm glad to see some work being done in the networking gear space utilizing open designs and firmware like this. Unfortunately, unless I find myself needing to network a datacenter in the near future, it's not immediately useful to me. That said, I do hope other developments in network gear that will be useful in other markets emerge from this effort. From my perspective, there's a gap in net…

I also wanted something in the category you're describing and after shopping around a bit I stumbled across Mikrotik's products. I bought one of their 24 port smart switches and it was exactly what I was looking for. Not a lot more expensive than some of the nicer consumer-targeted gear, but it has way more functionality.

http://routerboard.com/CRS125-24G-1S-IN

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#24

Post by pdkl95 »

Wow. That switching fabric is so much smaller than the HIPPI crossbar backplanes we used in the 100baseT/pre-GigE switches that I used to write firmware for... almost 20 years ago now. Of course, complexity means higher cost, so it's obvious why nobody bought our stuff. Hopefully, this open hardware project will have better luck!

/* it's easy to forget just how many iterations of Moore's Law have happened since the mid-90s */

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#25

Post by ay »

korethr wrote: post #19

This is rather cool, and I'm glad to see some work being done in the networking gear space utilizing open designs and firmware like this. Unfortunately, unless I find myself needing to network a datacenter in the near future, it's not immediately useful to me. That said, I do hope other developments in network gear that will be useful in other markets emerge from this effort. From my perspective, there's a gap in net…

I've the exact same needs, and by occasion got hold of cisco SG300-10 switch, which I think fits the description - so I thought to share my experience, in case it is useful.

I use it for the home lab, where I have a one-armed router serving multiple VLANs, and I have 3x MacMinis running Linux as a "server farm" (The latter I use because they are quite a good gear power-management wise, scaling from ~18W at idle up to ~250W when all cores are busy, and because they are very very quiet, which is handy when the "lab" is next to the bedroom).

The biggest complain I have about this box is that the only way to manage is the Web UI, and especially the 802.1q configuration is a bit unintuitive (though I just learned the firmware is actually upgradable to something with decent IOS CLI, so I will try it out and update here the impressions).

Otherwise, needing just a very simple L2 switching and 802.1q trunking at gigabit speeds, and fanless operation - I am pretty happy with it.

8 ports works well in my setup (the main segmentation/trunking is really in the lab, the rest is either wireless, or directly connected to the "border router").

Where I needed to add more access ports, I used http://www.conrad.com/ce/en/product/976050/CE-Port-Network-S... to help. Also based on my experience seems to be quite a solid building block for a small home/lab network.

full disclosure: I do work for cisco.

EDIT: the upgrade to the latest firmware indeed unearthed the checkboxes to enable telnet/ssh, as well as quite a few new features, comparable if not more than the "bigger brothers". What's pleasant is a quite comprehensive IPv6 support.

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#26

Post by wmf »

mey wrote: post #22
aaronbee wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook's Wedge 1U switch is what this builds on. https://code.facebook.com/posts/681382905244727/introducing-...

Is anyone building a copy of that to sell to other people besides Facebook? Similar to how you can buy a Backblaze Pod ( https://www.backblaze.com/blog/backblaze-storage-pod-4/ ) from http://www.45drives.com/

I haven't seen anyone selling Wedge specifically, but it's not that different from what you can get from Quanta, Edge-Core, or Penguin Computing.

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#27

Post by stock_toaster »

mey wrote: post #22
aaronbee wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook's Wedge 1U switch is what this builds on. https://code.facebook.com/posts/681382905244727/introducing-...

Is anyone building a copy of that to sell to other people besides Facebook? Similar to how you can buy a Backblaze Pod ( https://www.backblaze.com/blog/backblaze-storage-pod-4/ ) from http://www.45drives.com/

Apparently juniper is with their OCX1100[1] model.

[1]: http://forums.juniper.net/t5/Data-Center-Technologists/Junip...

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#28

Post by ay »

gh02t wrote: post #23
korethr wrote: post #19

This is rather cool, and I'm glad to see some work being done in the networking gear space utilizing open designs and firmware like this. Unfortunately, unless I find myself needing to network a datacenter in the near future, it's not immediately useful to me. That said, I do hope other developments in network gear that will be useful in other markets emerge from this effort. From my perspective, there's a gap in net…

I also wanted something in the category you're describing and after shopping around a bit I stumbled across Mikrotik's products. I bought one of their 24 port smart switches and it was exactly what I was looking for. Not a lot more expensive than some of the nicer consumer-targeted gear, but it has way more functionality. http://routerboard.com/CRS125-24G-1S-IN

Thanks for the link! Is it fanless too ?

the 15W consumption seems to hint it could be, but the datasheet does not mention it.

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#29

Post by mmastrac »

gh02t wrote: post #23
korethr wrote: post #19

This is rather cool, and I'm glad to see some work being done in the networking gear space utilizing open designs and firmware like this. Unfortunately, unless I find myself needing to network a datacenter in the near future, it's not immediately useful to me. That said, I do hope other developments in network gear that will be useful in other markets emerge from this effort. From my perspective, there's a gap in net…

I also wanted something in the category you're describing and after shopping around a bit I stumbled across Mikrotik's products. I bought one of their 24 port smart switches and it was exactly what I was looking for. Not a lot more expensive than some of the nicer consumer-targeted gear, but it has way more functionality. http://routerboard.com/CRS125-24G-1S-IN

That's the exact one I have. It's definitely not a "plug and play" router, but I love it. My only real beef is that most everything on it requires a much larger level of network administration knowledge than any other hardware.

I'm also scared that I'm going to open up my home intranet to the world every time I tweak some of the advanced settings.

Not trying to dissuade anyone from using them, but it's light years away from a DD-WRT-based router.

OTOH, the ability to run VMs on your router is magical. I have yet to do that, but I'm itching to do something like putting the unifi management tools on it.

Re: Introducing “6-pack”: the first open hardware modular switch

#30

Post by GeorgeBeech »

korethr wrote: post #19

This is rather cool, and I'm glad to see some work being done in the networking gear space utilizing open designs and firmware like this. Unfortunately, unless I find myself needing to network a datacenter in the near future, it's not immediately useful to me. That said, I do hope other developments in network gear that will be useful in other markets emerge from this effort. From my perspective, there's a gap in net…

The 2960 series has 8 and 24 port models, that are fully managed switchs - VLANs, management, anything that you can do in the IP Base IOS.

See the bottom of this page for models the 24 and 8 switches are what you are looking for. http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/switches/catalyst-2960...

Also, if you want a cheaper options the Dell Basic switches are fully managed and have just about any feature you could want.

http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/powerconnect-2800/fs

Unless I'm missing something that you are looking for.

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