ok is not a chipset limitation,
maybe a economical reason? too expensive to implement on small switches to be viable?? who knows…
it may even be a cultural issue, many people do not see the purpose of a small switch with strong manageable functions, many only think on big switches, and many only think on no manageable small switches, is a small niche market i think have to evolve, to increase the demand of this devices
I think is a very good idea to have small cheap very manageable switches, in certain scenarios you save money and space on cabling, i think is a modular approach to networking