A friend’s company is growing and needs to update its IT infrastructure and he has asked me for advice.
The current network is based upon Cisco/Linksys 2500 home routers/switches. It started out using one, but has grown to eight ? in a daisy chained configuration. This has now become a problem because the routing tables are not being constructed properly and some of the machines can’t see each other or various printers, scanners, etc. And what can see what changes whenever the entire system is rebooted by a power failure.
My suggestion, to start, is to replace all of the ‘home’ switches/routers with one or two higher end pieces of equipment. The problem is that my experience in this area is close to 20 years old. I would appreciate any suggestions for specific devices and companies that make them.
Also if anyone knows of a business in SE Florida that provides IT support on a consulting basis for small business I would appreciate contact information.
Well, these switches are pretty basic units. 5 port GE, no layer 3, no management, no tagging, nada.Since they don’t route, I’m guessing they have a limit to their spanning tree database that’s causing the wonkiness. * switches times four access ports a switch is 32 available ports.
My first worry, would be the mindset of the management at the company. Going from consumer gear to professional gear, increases cost expectations pretty significantly, and includes considerations like maintenance and support contracts as well.
The second worry is that the boss will bring in his sisters son, who sis says knows a lot about computers and stuff because he plays a lot of computer games, to put something together because real IT pro’s cost real money.
I don’t know any reputable service companies in the area, but if they’ve hit that many connected employees, they probably need to sit down and decide where they’re going before investing in gear. In the meantime, to get the lan up, I’d buy an inexpensive cisco 2900 class 48 port switch from a resale place, until I could get a longer term plan in place. The switchgear is just one aspect of that plan.
I have informed him that it will cost $$$. I have told him to think about how much he can spend before the business is ‘not worth it’. Since that is a more reasonable value to consider then where he feels ‘uncomforable’.
I have already started researching companies in the area and will be contacting them to arrange interviews and get references. I was hoping for someone with personal knowledge of someone in the area, since I don’t like selecting from a cold call list.
I need to talk with him, but I suspect he will want two. Also depending upon model and price, I may be interested in one as well.
In any case, I will likely pick the items up and arrange shipping for him. I am trying to also talk him into taking some of the Simmonds phones as well.