What are the Differences Between S5850-48S8C and N5860-48SC Switches

FS N-series switches are data center switches, while S-series are enterprise-class switches. There is a big difference between the two. Enterprise switches can provide data forwarding for Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet, and 10 Gigabit Ethernet, and have CLI, Web, SNMP, and other management functions and operable configuration functions. When it is used as a backbone switch, it can support more than 500 information points.

Data centers require higher density and bandwidth and have higher requirements for accurate identification and control of services. Therefore, data center switches generally use technologies such as large cache, virtualization, FCoE, and TRILL (Large Layer 2) to achieve fast response without packet loss, and ensure service continuity and system reliability.

What the S5850-48S8C and N5860-48SC Have in Common

The S5850-48S8C has significant advantages in port density and performance among enterprise switches, which is one of the reasons why it can be used in the core layer of the campus network. Compared with N5860-48SC, the two have some similarities in basic functions and hardware, especially ports, basic performance, etc.

Ports: They both have 48x 10G SFP+ and 8x 100G QSFP28 uplinks.

Hardware: 2 power supplies and 4 fans design.

Security: In terms of network security and reliability, both of them support SSH, ACL and other features to protect your network.

Basic functions: They all support data center features, such as PFC, ECN, etc., to better achieve low-latency network performance. Besides, MLAG performance ensures the stability of business traffic.

Differences Between S5850-48S8C and N5860-48SC

S5850-48S8C Performance

The S5850-48S8C managed enterprise switch provides a 2.56 Tbps switching capacity and 1905 Mpps forwarding rate. It is equipped with hardware-level dual flash memory chips, which provide excellent processing performance and network reliability. Furthermore, it features advanced features such as EVPN, MPLS, VPLS, etc. through purchasing a license. MPLS enables small and medium-sized operators to create tunnels for their users, which help to establish point-to-point connections and realize intercommunication between user networks.

In addition, the S5850-48S8C supports Triple-play Service Support, which can provide high bandwidth for triple-play services such as IPTV and video surveillance.

The S5850-48S8C switch can be used at the access layer of large campus networks and at the core layer of SMEs.

N5860-48SC Performance

The N5860-48SC is a ToR high-density switch in a compact 1U form factor that integrates rich features including industry-leading Broadcom silicon, RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE), and more for scalable and flexible data center spine-leaf design. It combines the advantages of lossless Ethernet with zero packet loss, low latency, and non-blocking performance.

The N5860-48SC simplifies repetitive network configuration through automation helpers such as NETCONF, Python, Ansible, gRPC, OpenFlow, etc., which greatly saves daily operating costs and time. At the same time, the GR (Graceful Restart) and BFD (Bidirectional Forwarding) mechanisms ensure that the network can achieve millisecond-level fault detection and recovery even under heavy traffic conditions.

N5860-48SC is mainly used in the access layer of high-density data center to undertake high-density data packet forwarding.

Summary

In general, the two switches have their features and different application scenarios. If you are more focused on flow control technology, you can choose S5850-48S8C as the core or access layer of the enterprise network. If you pay more attention to data center features and have high demands for low latency and high-performance transmission, you can choose the N5860-48SC switch.