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Case Study: How to Build a Scalable 10G Network for SMB?

Updated on Jan 11, 2022 by
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Most small to medium enterprises are facing the problem of the frequently changing company infrastructure deployment and network environment. Therefore, the ability to flexibly deploy a cost-effective and scalable Ethernet network in a short time paves the way for SMB’s success.

The following post mainly focuses on how to deploy an economical and extensive 10G SMB network with FS S-series switches, which may help you get some clues about enterprise network building.

 

Case Study of Enterprise Network Building

Customer Requirements

According to our customer’s description, they are mainly a 10G network with hundreds of network nodes that need to be set in two different buildings. The distance between these two buildings is no longer than 500 meters.

The customer wants the FS technical team to help him design a turnkey network deploying solution within their limited budget. And this 10G network solution needs to take their future growth into consideration. In addition, all the devices involved in the solution need to be available and cost-effective. The details about network environment and customer’s special needs for network switches have been listed as below:

Network Environment

  • Building 1: It’s a small building with about 100 ports needing to be deployed. And one rack needs to be connected with 10G Ethernet.

  • Building 2: It’s a two-story data building where 256 ports need to be connected. And two server racks need to be connected with 10G Ethernet.

Special Needs for Network Switches

The client wants to take 4 x 48 port PoE switches as access switches, 8 x Gigabit access switches like S3900-48T4S managed stackable switches, and 1 x 10Gbe switch like FS S5850-48S6Q 10G SFP+ switch as the aggregation switch.

Networking Solution with FS S-Series Network Switches

Based on the customer’s needs and networking environment, FS technical team helps the client perfect his solution as below. Other equipment like fiber cables, copper cables, and fiber optic transceivers have also been included in this design, but here we will focus on the network switches.

10G Enterprise Network Solution with FS S-Series Network Switches

Figure 1: 10G Enterprise Network Solution with FS S-Series Network Switches

 

Switch Type Switching Capacity Building #1 Building #2
10G Access Switch 1.28 Tbps S5850-48T4Q (1pc) S5850-48T4Q (2pcs)
1G/10G Access Switch 176 Gbps S3900-48T4S (4pcs) S3900-48T4S (5pcs)
1G PoE Access Switch 38.69Gbps S1600-48T4S (2pcs) S1600-48T4S (3pcs)
10G Aggregation Switch 176 Gbps S5800-8TF12S (1pc) S5800-8TF12S (1pc)

S5850-48T4Q: Better Choice for 10G/40G Ethernet Growth

As shown in the solution diagram, there are two server racks in each building. And these server racks are required to link with 10G Ethernet interfaces due to the revision of customer’s switching infrastructure. Considering that, FS technical team suggests putting FS S5850-48T4Q Ethernet switches in each building to provide connections for those 10G Ethernet racks.

While for most SMB users, their server racks are available to 10G optical Interfaces. In that case, they can skip this section and directly connect their racks with the appropriate core switch or aggregation switch. In the following part, we will introduce the selection of the aggregation switch.

This 10GBase-T switch with 40G uplinks can sufficiently process central traffic of the two buildings, and also ensure all the network nodes to be covered. As for this type of switch, it can provide 1.28 Tbps switching capacity and support up to 952.3 Mpps throughput for data-intensive environments. In addition, it is an ideal choice for traditional or fully virtualized data centers, which can support many advanced features, including MLAG, VXLAN, NVGRE, SNMP etc.

FS S5850-48T4Q 10GBase-T Switch

Figure 2: FS S5850-48T4Q 10GBase-T Switch

 

S3900-48T4S: Ensuring Future Network Extension

As customer’s requirement listed in the first section, he wants to have eight more S3900-48T4S access switches set in two buildings. However, after our technical team’s evaluation of his actual network environment, they recommend deploy nine S3900-48T4S 10GB switches. Four network switches will be placed in Building 1, four in the first floor of Building 2, and one in the second floor of Building 2.

In order to cover all the network nodes and also take the future expansion into consideration, our team would advise our customer to stack those FS S3900-48T4S network switches in each building, as shown in figure 1. In that way, hundreds of office devices like computers and printers can be connected. Even if the customer wants to expand the office and network in the future and needs more ports, he can simply add more stackable switches without changing the whole deployment.

FS S3900-48T4S Gigabit Stackable Managed Switch

Figure 3: FS S3900-48T4S Gigabit Stackable Managed Switch

 

S1600-48T4S: Providing Various Connections

In order to support multiple PoE and non-PoE network devices, FS prefers to deploy FS S1600-48T4S 48-Port Gigabit PoE+ managed network switches in this enterprise network as access switches. These network switches can protect sensitive information, and optimize the network bandwidth to deliver information more effectively.

Note: FS S1600-48T4S is no longer available, for customers who are interested in S1600-48T4S, you can choose S3400-48T4SP instead.

FS S1600-48T4S Gigabit PoE+ Managed Network Switch

Figure 4: FS S1600-48T4S Gigabit PoE+ Managed Network Switch

 

S5800-8TF12S: Offering RJ45/SFP/SFP+ Ports with Lower Cost

As for the aggregation switch, the customer plans to use FS S5850-48S6Q 10G SFP+ switch. Considering the special needs for the 10G optical interface of racks and the ports of the aggregation layer, FS suggests our customer select FS S5800-8TF12S 10gbe switch as the aggregation switch. Notably, as we mentioned before, the racks in this enterprise network need to connect with 10G Ethernet interface. 10GBASE-T SFP+ transceiver module should be used to solve this problem. By using this type of network switch, we successfully help our customer cut half of the expense.

In addition, with 12x 10G SFP+ ports for uplink connections and 8x 1G combo ports for access networks, FS S5800-8TF12S is a good option for hyper-converged infrastructure. It offers a low-cost, low-latency and low-power value solution for HCI.

FS S5800-8TF12S 10GB Switch

Figure 5: FS S5800-8TF12S 10GB Switch

 

Conclusion

When designing an enterprise network, you need to consider many factors, such as the network size, the number of network nodes, the distance to be covered, future growth, the equipment involved, etc. In the short term, it may be a time-consuming project. However, in a long term, a stable, efficient, and scalable enterprise network will have your effort paid in the near future.

Since customer experience means everything for enterprises, a slight delay may alienate your customers. In that context, a quick response to building enterprise networks matters a lot.

Surely, if there is any need, you can turn to sales@fs.com or FS.com for help. We can provide not only a series of networking products but also network solutions tailored for your enterprise network deployment.

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