PCA Forums

at work we are moving from an inhouse timekeeping system to a web-based system (time matters 4.1 ) mackme to time matter 8.0 then to 9.0)

our current in house network is all 10/100 wireless router(linksys w45g) and a 24 port switch with a 20 port switch daisy chained off that to serve offices next door.

our internet is a nominal 8mb down 768 up. Comcast.

we will be adding some kind of cisco firewall on the front end

the 24 port switch is about 5 years old, can't remember the brand but close to a grand new. It has a lifetime warranty, if your willing to ship it and wait, or you can do a hot swap for a couple of hundred bucks.

the throughput on the system is generally fine, but it can only support about 4 streaming video/audio apps

does it make and sense to go to a 1 gigabit router and a 1 gigabit switch?

I was in OM the other day and they had a 1 gig version of the same router for about $100

the fan is going up on the big switch, and i'm sure all the new stuff is 10/100/1 gig, so that could be replaced under the warranty for a couple of hundred bucks?

I realize that it won't make any difference with the internet, but we do a fair amount of looking at internal files over the network (we scan every piece of paper that comes through the door). We also do backups from one computer to another.

any ideas are welcomed!

TIA

when i told hq that we might be a little short on the server side (dell p4 2400 installed 1999) they said, ok as long as our people spec it for you, we'll pay for it. I did what they asked and the puppy arrived today in a Dell box with wooden supports on the bottom. box must weight ~ 100 lbs.

inside is a dual quad core xeon (try saying that fast) , 4 gb ram, 4 hdd /raid 5.

after i figure out how to make it do what the boss wants, I'm gonna use it to take over the Nigerian Space program

Out of all that I would say only consider the gigabit if the PC to PC backups were time sensitive to who evers doing them as thats the only link in ur setup that will benifit. Or with the server having a gigabit backbone to it would help allow 10 others to have full speed at 10/100 to the new server.


also you wouldnt need the router to be gigabit just the switch

to get any real significance out of a gigabit switch make sure you have at the following

"GOOD" (intel/nvidia/3com) PCI express nic card's. normal PCI cant go much faster than 67 megabits. some can do up to 75. not even close to 1000
fast hard drives. 1 gigabit speed is approximately 120 megabytes per second. if your hard drive cant read that fast its a bottleneck
cat5e cables. you will need this at the minimum bandwidth end of the 1 gig spectrum. that means each pair is rated at 350mhz at 300 feet. i suggest cat6 shielded for max speed.
a good gigabit switch. some crappy linksys or netgear isnt gonna do ya in the long run. my suggestion is to maybe get 3com minimum

you will get some performance increase regardless because the processors on the switch function at a higher rate of speed.