Gigabit router

Y.B.Sober

Hi guys. I'm on the lookout for a 4port gigabit router. has anybody seen one down the back of their sofa lately? Or more realistically, does anyone know where one can be purchased, and how much?

thanks

Capt'n Midnight

Do you mean switch ?

I'm not aware of the existance of any Gigabit Routers that a home user could afford, and I've not heard of a Gigabit hub either.

If you are looking for a gigabit router - get a PC with two gigabit cards and use an OS that allows routing, windows is slow and does not allow source routing.

If you want to share broadband, then you are looking at a firewall that does NAT but it may be described incorrectly as a router. There is no point since you can't get a 100Mb or even a 10Mb internet connection (even wireless won't saturate a 10Mb full duplex connection unless the ISP is giving you 10Mb uncontended bandwidth) never mind gigabit. Simply plug the broad band ethernet device into a gigabit port.

I take it you are looking for a gigabit switch instead...

/RANT - I have wasted too many hours searching for information on routers (devices that allow source based routing) when all references are to incorrectly named NAT'd firewalls.

I seem to remeber them being about €138 last time I looked. - can't find link

Y.B.Sober

thanks for the detailed reply, but looking for a router with 4 gigabit ports. im attempting to upgrade a fast ethernet lan to gigabit. nave the network cards, am looking at several switches, but can't find a suitable managed router. any ideas/help would be appreciated.

bazooka

why do you need the router part? get yourself a gigabit switch, and have gigabit between your internal clients, you will never need to route at gigabit speeds (unless you are an ISP!)

ressem

You haven't mentioned whether the gigabit ports are meant to be lan or wan, copper or fibreoptic. To be blunt, if you're putting that sort of setup together, you'll really need training in the equipment.

If you really need a 4 port gigabit router, to plug say multiple layer 2 48 port switches into, you'd be looking at something at least like a cisco 2800/3800 series with a few added gigabit cards, at the cost of a few grand. I'm sure you can find some vendors and consultants happy to advise you, including eircom and esat, if you must.

If this is for medium sized office then you don't need a gigabit router.

If you're looking to isolate traffic, you might just use a layer 3 switch (a switch with routing, vlan capabilites), available with 12 ports or more. Again you're looking at a cost of thousands from Cisco. Haven't used the other low cost brands like Dell or Netgear.

Y.B.Sober

the gigabit ports are for a copper lan. My posts were hurried and not entirely acurate. An ideal setup would be a multi layer switch, as you said with vlan capabilities. Of course there are lots of consulatants out there willing to give information(at a price) but its normally the guy on the street who has the best knowledge. As for training, i have CCNA, but this is my first attempt at serious networking and is been done as a favour.