Timothy
Parker Consulting Incorporated
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Digi MiLAN 10/100 Ethernet Switches There are lots of small, inexpensive 10Mbps Ethernet
switches on the market. There are
lots of large, expensive 10/100Mbps Ethernet switches on the market.
Digi’s new MiLAN series of Ethernet switches offers the best of both
worlds: a small, relatively inexpensive 10/100Mbps Ethernet switch.
(MiLAN is a subsidiary of Digi.) The advantage of the MiLAN series is
that it frees up desk and rack space by offering both 10 and 100 Mbps Ethernet
connectivity in a single unit that measures the same size as small dedicated
10Mbps Ethernet hubs. Previously, you had to buy a much larger (and more
expensive) box to provide both speeds of the same switch. Digi provided both four and eight port switches for us to
test. Sixteen and twenty-four port
units are also available, and all the MiLAN switches can be chained together for
almost infinite expansion. The
eight-port unit is compact, measuring eight inches wide, an inch high, and four
inches deep. The four port unit is
only six inches wide. The front
panel of the switches holds the RJ-45 ports for devices, as well as one extra
port for uplinking to other switches. This
is a departure from many compact switches that make one of the ports double as
an uplink, effectively robbing one port from use.
Also on the front panel is a set of LEDs for each port connectivity and
current speed, as well as a power indicator.
The back of the switch has a small port for the wall-wart power supply.
A wall mount kit is thoughtfully included.
Each port features autonegotiation of speed and duplex (both half and
full duplex is supported) and any mix of speeds can be handled on the ports. To test the MiLAN switches, we replaced a much larger
eight-port 10/100Mbps unit with the eight-port MiLAN. A mix of eight clients was connected, each capable of 10 and
100Mbps Ethernet, as well as switching between full and half duplex
instantaneously through a software control panel. The MiLAN was then routed through the uplink port to a
managed HP forty-eight port switch. The
four-port MiLAN was connected to four network devices including a high-speed HP
8100DN color laser and a Tektronix Phaser 850 color laser. A CD-DVD tower (eight CD drives and four DVD drives in a
networked subsystem and a separate RAID disk subsystem with 120GB disk space
were also connected to the four-port hub. All
four devices can be switched between 10 and 100Mbps speeds.
We were curious about how well the MiLANs would handle clients switching
between 10 and 100Mbps transfers of large files, as well as high-volume requests
to the four-port connected devices. We
loaded up the eight PC clients with scripts running under WinRunner and let the
system run full-out for two days. The MiLAN switches easily handled the devices changing
speeds between 10 and 100 Mbps, as well as between full and half duplex.
There appears to be internal logic in the switches that allows for fast
transfers between devices of the same speed (100 to 100, for example) with
forwarding of the packets to the different speeds handled with a beraly
measurable delay. The MiLAN’s
internal circuitry appears quite complex, with most of the tasks handled by
dedicated chips. We were unable to make the MiLAN switch hesitate at all, easily
routing all our requests despite high Ethernet traffic flows. These are impressive switches not just for their size, but
also for their capabilities. With
the four port retailing at $140 and the eight-port retailing for $215, the
prices are not far above those of 10Mbps-only switches. The added flexibility of switching speeds and interconnecting
devices (especially without expensive managed dual-speed switches) makes these
MiLAN switches a winner. MiLAN 10/100 Mbps Ethernet Switches Summary: Inexpensive talented dual speed Ethernet switches. If you need a switch, this is a great buy. |
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tparker@tpci.com with
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