I’m using Cisco Switch 2960-TTL (10/100Mbps) from Long time (approx 3 years), now I’m trying to change vendor from Cisco to Mikrotik and willing to purchase (CRS326-24G-2S+RM OR CRS125-24G-1S-IN)… as there is less theoretical information available for Mikrotik…
I need suggestion what to select??
I need Giga Ports
I also need 10G port between my Router (CCR1036) & Switch (new one which I need).
I need better throughput as compare to present 2960TTL switch.
I think the CRS326 would be better since you’ll have a extra sfp port should you need it later. I recently replaced a entire campus of dell power connect series (which are pretty close to cisco switches in terms of features and cmd interface) with the CRS226 series.
Configuration of the vlans was a pain, but with the new switchOS it should be alot easier.
The only thing I miss that was on the dell’s was the POE. With the CRS I have to use a seperate POE injector bay.
Thanks Kevin… for helping me to take appropriate decision.
One more thing need to ask… I Google to find about the processing speed for Cisco & DELLPower Connect Series but I can’t able to find about their processing speed as what it is easier in Mikroitk?? How we can differentiate that miktorik Processor are good enough from other vendors??
The CPU on both Cisco and Mikrotik switches is used for management purposes (snmp stats, cli management, etc) and does not affect the data path.
Switching is not done in CPU. Neither on Cisco/Dell nor on Mikrotik.
Switching is done on dedicated ASIC chips specifically designed for this job (thus giving wirespeed).
So comparing the CPUs won’t mean much about forwarding performance - which is the metric you should care about.
IMHO since you are upgrading from a Fast Ethernet switch, unless you really need to push 1Gbit on all ports simultaneously or millions packets per second, or use more advanced features, you won’t see any noticeable performance difference between any vendor.
I’m running the CCR series in a large campus. I have one switch acting as my fiber distribution switch, then the CCR226s as the local access switches. (The property spans an entire block) I have about 200+ active VLANS (vlaning out a gigabit ISP feed to individual tenants) and it works really well.
As mentioned above, the switching is done via its own dedicated set of “switch-chips”.
During peak hours my cpu spikes up to 7%
I think the cloud core series will serve you well. BUT if you need POE be sure to factor that in. Using external POE sources is a pain and I wish Mikrotik would hurry up and add a POE line.
One of my big problems with Mikrotik switches is their power. I would prefer to pay another couple hundred dollars to have dual power supplies that are removable. More of the sites we bring online have dual power feeds and/or do maintenance on one of the feeds monthly. We cannot use Mikrotik in these cases.
Kevintitus81, your post interested me as you describe a corporate use possibly with customers with SLAs who would not be happy with downtime. I am not a network engineer but a project manager who is reasonably technical - I use the MikroTik hAP-ac, wAP-ac and CSS326s at home.
Can I ask you how you manage your MikroTik environment please? How do you know if it is healthy, or whether someone has created a loop, or is consuming excess bandwidth?, Or if one of your switches goes down?
How do you do configuration control, and deploy changes to all your CSS switches?
What would you do if your fiber dist switch went down?
Cisco has ready answers for all these questions - at a price. I’m interested to see what the MikroTik equivalent is is the real world.
When you need any of those and you are not prepared to wait for announced features and use beta software,
you better go for an established switch manufacturer. MikroTik switches are just toys and the software is a
nice try but nothing compared to Cisco/Procurve/Aruba/Juniper etc.
However, when you just require basic switching they may well be good enough for you, and of course a lot cheaper.
Basically I run the switches on APC UPS units for battery backup…those have snmp (along with the mikrotiks). We use zabbix to monitor via snmp. I monitor via “the dude” as well. As far as swithc loops and whatnot, the gear is in locked closets, and the ports are setup as needed (so you can’t just plug in to get ont he network) Bandwidth is handled via the upstream mikrotik where I have queues for each VLAN. I set the bandwidth to each subscribers paid rate.
If the fiber distribution switch goes down the cust is down. They didn’t choose to pay for redundant fiber links.
Something else to consider when deciding on a Cisco or Mikrotik (router or switch):
What type of network monitoring software will you be using to auto check all network devices in your network ?
Most/many network monitoring software systems natively understand, support and auto-detect Cisco devices and support Cisco SNMP OIDs (CPU, temp, load, bandwidth, errors, power supply status, and many other sub-system counters in a Cisco device.
When configuring your existing network monitor system(s), your network monitor system(s) may not even know what a Mikrotik is and probably does not have native built-in MIBs/OIDs used by SNMP to auto-check/monitor a network. Thus, an administrator would probably need to configure the Mikrotik graphic icons & configure all of the SNMP checks for MIBs/OIDs from/to a Mikrotik. I don’t know about you, but although I have been doing this stuff for decades, it still takes me some time to figure out how to import or write SNMP system checks every time I add a new un-known network device.
Don’t get me wrong here … I think Mikrotik routers & switches are great. I like them and use them almost everywhere. However, because Mikrotik is still the new kid on the block when it comes to carrier-grade commercial-grade business grade high-throughput products, it may sometimes be a little difficult to find local network technicians or local phone support for Mikrotik products when adding new equipment into your network. ((( Example, Existing Mikrotik and/or Cisco network devices and you are now adding a telco phone VoIP soft-switch and you also need POE out to an ethernet connected SIP device.))) With Cisco - just google. With Mikrotik - google & google & google and check the forums & google & goodle.
Some things I does not like with Cisco 36xx and 38xx
If you like dual power (removable) the are deep. (how to remove the power when its in a rack, very complicated if you do not have a 1 meter rack with access from behind)
The short version (M) does not have dual power, nor is it removable,
The short version makes more noise than the deep version.
So tip to Mikrotik:
Create a short 2 U 24/48 port switch.
Add removable power in front in one of the U, and 24/48 in the other half.
Also add 2 U fans in the rear of the swtich.
I think nobody today will make a “standard” 24/48 port switch in more than 1U. Just impossible to sell.
To have any market for a 2U switch it should have 96 ports (or maybe 80 when you need some front space).