-1

I have recently entered the world of multi-gig networking and have discovered SFP/SFP+ transceivers, DACs, and ACOs seem to be the wild west in terms of compatibility. I am hoping to describe my situation, discuss what I have done, and ask where I may go in the future.

Equipment :

  1. DELL R620 which features a Intel X520/I350 NIC
  2. Netgear XS508M unmanaged switch
  3. TP-Link TL-SM53010-T (10GBASE-T RJ45 to SFP+)
  4. Cat 8 Ethernet Cable (overkill I know)
  5. Sagemcom FAST 5290 Router (provided by ISP w/ their 2 Gig service)

So far I have not been able to get 2 Gig speeds and have tried the following set up. Rj45 cable connection between the routers 2.5GB port and netgears Rj45 10GB port. RJ45 cable connecting from another 10GB RJ45 switch to the servers SFP+ w/ the above TP-Link transceiver (RJ45 to SFP+).

The switches lights indicate that it is connecting to the router at 1GB speeds and I cant seem to work around this. I've dug through the setting on the routers interface to see if the 2.5GB needs to be "activated" or something. The same switches lights indicate 10GB connection between the Server and the switch. Speed tests from the server show only 1 Gig speeds which is expected given what the switch is indicated.

I have a UDM-SE on the way and hope this mitigates any weirdness from the ISP provided router and gives me more control.

With that said here are a few questions :

  1. Can anyone see any compatibility issues with what I described, specifically with the transceivers? Cant figure out for the life of me why I am not getting the full speed, could use a sanity check here.
  2. Im thinking once the UDM-SE arrives that I want to connect to the router to the switch with an optical cable. I'm looking for cable suggestions given the above equipment. Browsing the web, I see things are often labeled "cisco compatible", or "intel compatible", etc... Given that I am multi vendored, I struggled navigating this as it is all new to me.

Side Note : I had to follow the following instructuions to allow the DELL server to utilize the "non-dell" sfp+ module. I do not believe this to be causing any issues mentioned above but am open to the possibility. "Unsupported module type was detected" during boot of Intel X520/I350 card in Dell PowerEdge R630

LCaraway
  • 99
  • 1
  • 1
    X520 NICs are compatible with Intel-branded transceivers only (may be 3rd party) and generic/MSA DACs. I'd recommend 10GBASE-SR (FTLX8571D3BCV-IT or AFBR-703SDZ-IN2) for your purpose. – Zac67 Sep 19 '22 at 21:12

0 Answers0