Connecting two Home buildings

SoundEng

SoundEng

SoundEng

Soldato
Joined
4 Mar 2008
Posts
2,614
Location
Wandsworth
Hello,

Let me give you a current background. So at the moment I have a linksys SPS2024 24 port gigabit switch, connected to two server running 2008 and 2008 r2 respectively, my computer, a test machine, and a home server running WHS 2011. I use my computer for recording a lot of music and the odd bit of video.

In the house there are also 6 other computers currently connected wirelessly throughout the house. At the moment I am located upstairs with the router, switch, and servers all next to me, and all the other computers are downstairs. I cannot run cat6 to them as I have quite an old house (1880 i think it was built) and my parents won't let me run it anywhere visible.

However soon, we are getting an outbuilding built where I will be moving all my studio stuff. We are getting a 'cupboard' (more like a sound proof box) to house all the servers in (this will be in the outbuilding).

As the other computers are located in the main house they will need to be connected somehow to the router and switch in the outbuilding.

The outbuilding will be located about 25 metres from the main house.

Now I am quite interested in networking and want to broaden my range within it, so i was thinking i could buy two switches with 4gb fibre and put one in the main house and one in the outbuilding and connect them? And then have each computer running off the respective switch?

I know someone will say just run a cat6 to the main house, but this would only give me gigabit speed to share between 6 (maybe more in the future) computers. The computers all require access to the servers as most of the audio files/render files/projects are stored on them. I will probably have about 4 of the computers using the connection at once, and they will all need quite a lot of bandwidth for the files, so this is why a single gigabit link would not be fast enough.

So could someone tell me the best way to achieve this? and recommend a switch which will do this. The linksys switch i have currently does have two fiber ports on it, however I do not know what speed they are?

any help is much appreciated :)

Also I would like to keep this as cheap as possible, I have no idea what a realistic budget would be, so if someone could say that would be grand :)

Cheers guys :)
 
dont think it needs a module? there are two ports on the front that arent rj45 and are quite deep connectors...

2webdcn.jpg


that any help?

cheers
 
They are for SFP GBICs (the modules mentioned above) you will need to pick to linksys or compatible ones.

I do recommend running fibre otherwise you might end up with dead switches during lightning storms (and yes it does happen and no it doesn't have to actually strike)
 
dave-lew99 said:
They are for SFP GBICs (the modules mentioned above) you will need to pick to linksys or compatible ones.

I do recommend running fibre otherwise you might end up with dead switches during lightning storms (and yes it does happen and no it doesn't have to actually strike)
Click to expand...

ok the first bit doesnt make much sense to me :p i am a complete noob when it comes to fiber... :/ as it is GBIC does that mean it will only do 1GB/s?

Yes that would be another reason (unless you are being sarcastic?) and I have heard running Ethernet outside is not great... :/
 
GBICs are a standard format, but not all GBICs work in all GBIC slots - for example. Cisco SPFs work in a Brocade switch, but whilst the Brocade SPFs are seen by Cisco swicthes they don't actually do anything.
There are SFPs available that are faster than 1Gb but costing upwards or £1k each.

I doubt he's being sarcastic - lightning + electronic kit = disaster.
 
PistolPete said:
GBICs are a standard format, but not all GBICs work in all GBIC slots - for example. Cisco SPFs work in a Brocade switch, but whilst the Brocade SPFs are seen by Cisco swicthes they don't actually do anything.
There are SFPs available that are faster than 1Gb but costing upwards or £1k each.

I doubt he's being sarcastic - lightning + electronic kit = disaster.
Click to expand...

ok, so i need to get some kind of adapter to use the ports on the linksys switch? could someone point me to these? The fact that there are two ports, would this mean that i could team them together to get double speed? or are there two, one for each direction?

1K each?! that would be wayyyy out of my budget :/
 
Don't worry, no sarcasm here, i've seen it happen. (switches dying)

More info on SFPs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_form-factor_pluggable_transceiver

They are only going to be 1Gb each though, however, the switch supports LACP so you could team them together (need twice as meany SFPs and fibre though).

A quick look about finds this http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/modules/ps4999/products_qanda_item09186a0080abed87.shtml which appears to be the correct one for your switch, (claimed) compatible ones i've seen for £23 each.

The last fibre run i bought was about £35 for 30m. Make sure you get the right terminations and type!
 
hmm ok thanks, I'm not sure if 2gb would be enough bandwidth tbh :/ in reality is it going to be feasible to go any faster? (with a 16 year olds budget + parents budget) :L i.e could you recommend me two switches and any modules required.. i won't need any pc adapters because i am going to be using pro 1000 quad and dual ports which i will set up with teaming

thanks for the info
 
Are you sure you NEED more than 1Gb??

I have a larger number of physical and virtual machines, large amounts of storage and regularly stream HD content to multiple machines at once and I've never knowingly bottlenecked on the network.

I teamed 4 NICs in my storage server before realising I never hit 1Gb anyway.
 
3dcandy said:
1 gb should be enough, might get some slowdowns but unless everyone is hammering the connections it will suffice.
Click to expand...

Exactly, how often are you really going to be shifting hundreds of GB at a time from multiple computers between the locations? Backups can be done incrementally and scheduled for the early hours.

For music/occasional video editing I think 1Gb/s would be more than enough. Might be best off just running a couple of cheap gigabit switches at each end with some CAT5e between, If you lose a £15 switch to lightning (not an especially likely event) it's not a big deal. SFP's and managed switches are going to cost you hundreds, even at second hand prices.

I think you need to take a realistic look at your bandwidth requirements.
 
Chances of you needing >1gigabit for a couple of servers and clients is pretty low. Are the servers regularly maxing out their connections at the moment?

Do some research into the GBICs your switches support- might be something like these, looks pretty cheap to get hold of.
 
Also bear in mind even if you did have say 4 machines shifting data around, if they are all reading/writing from/to the same server (unclear) you will likely get bottlenecked by drive speeds on the server anyway (assuming it's not some sort of RAID/SSD setup).

Not saying you don't have a genuine need for more than 1Gbit however it is something I would address in terms of, what would the 'damage' be of only having a 1Gbit link? Would it matter if transfer took a bit longer on the occasions when you have many machines hammering the network? Could you live with this say 80% of the time, and the other 20% of the time when you genuinely need fast transfer, maybe utilise fewer client connections? How frequently do you see yourself getting bottlenecked, could you temper this by physically porting some stuff around on a USB3 HD (again not suggesting this is a solution, obviously you wouldn't want to do this very often).
 
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mole90 said:
Chances of you needing >1gigabit for a couple of servers and clients is pretty low. Are the servers regularly maxing out their connections at the moment?

Do some research into the GBICs your switches support- might be something like these, looks pretty cheap to get hold of.
Click to expand...

they do seem to be maxing them out yes.

Ah cheers they look like the right ones. I may just go for the two gigabit fibre link teamed, then if that is not enough then maybe upgrade in the future

anyway this outbuilding has only just gone into planning applications so it may not even happen!

Zarf said:
Exactly, how often are you really going to be shifting hundreds of GB at a time from multiple computers between the locations? Backups can be done incrementally and scheduled for the early hours.

For music/occasional video editing I think 1Gb/s would be more than enough. Might be best off just running a couple of cheap gigabit switches at each end with some CAT5e between, If you lose a £15 switch to lightning (not an especially likely event) it's not a big deal. SFP's and managed switches are going to cost you hundreds, even at second hand prices.

I think you need to take a realistic look at your bandwidth requirements.
Click to expand...

well they do seem to be maxing out the connections atm. the server is maxing out its 2gb teamed connection very often so it may be necessary for more actually.

I can't run backups in the early hours because nearly all the clients are off then. (as my parents do not want me running them 24/7) and it is imperative they are backed up daily.

Also buying cheap £15 switches has never worked for me as they are always **** they tend to be slow and unreliable, hence the reason for getting an expensive switch in the first place and opting for fibre.

HangTime said:
Also bear in mind even if you did have say 4 machines shifting data around, if they are all reading/writing from/to the same server (unclear) you will likely get bottlenecked by drive speeds on the server anyway (assuming it's not some sort of RAID/SSD setup).

Not saying you don't have a genuine need for more than 1Gbit however it is something I would address in terms of, what would the 'damage' be of only having a 1Gbit link? Would it matter if transfer took a bit longer on the occasions when you have many machines hammering the network? Could you live with this say 80% of the time, and the other 20% of the time when you genuinely need fast transfer, maybe utilise fewer client connections? How frequently do you see yourself getting bottlenecked, could you temper this by physically porting some stuff around on a USB3 HD (again not suggesting this is a solution, obviously you wouldn't want to do this very often).
Click to expand...

yes the server is a RAID setup, and about to be connected to a 3TB Ultra320 SCSI array.

tbh the damage would be nothing in terms of cost (as i do not run this as a business, almost as a hobby/for school etc) but would annoy me if I was constantly having to wait for them to finish. Also if I am doing live audio editing, the files CANNOT get bottlenecked by the network as this would much up the whole mixing process. And I need to be able to right to the server in realtime while recording up to 16 tracks of audio

cheers
 
Gonna get expensive then for what it will achieve.....and I reckon you're maxing out the wireless more than maxing out the switch/server etc.
Your router has QoS and I reckon with some tweaking that will improve your bandwidth. I'd love to go down the fibre route but it's just so much more expensive for not a great deal more bandwidth that I just cannot justify it. I had far better results with changing QoS than I did from going from wireless to wired....
 
Surely in your current configuration the bottle neck is going to be the computers are being accessed wirelessly?

Also why are you using WHS to wake the computers in the night, back the up and then put them back to sleep? That's how mine are working.
 
well they do seem to be maxing out the connections atm. the server is maxing out its 2gb teamed connection very often so it may be necessary for more actually.

I can't run backups in the early hours because nearly all the clients are off then. (as my parents do not want me running them 24/7) and it is imperative they are backed up daily.

Also buying cheap £15 switches has never worked for me as they are always **** they tend to be slow and unreliable, hence the reason for getting an expensive switch in the first place and opting for fibre.
Click to expand...

It's pretty easy to get the pc to shutdown after the backup completes, Acronis can wake the computer up from a low power sleep, take a backup, then shutdown. You could even turn them off completely and use wake on LAN to power them up for the backup remotely during the early hours.

Nothing wrong with cheap gigabit switches in my experience, i've got a couple of cheap Asus ones that cost me something like £20 each 4 years ago. Still going strong and have no trouble shifting gigabit traffic over them (I get over 100MB/s, without jumbo frames enabled (though they do support them), and am probably limited more by my NICs or TCP/IP settings than the switches themselves)

Since you've determined there is a case for >= 2gb/s , why not move your server and managed switch into the studio? that way you can team nics to your hearts delight, and just have a single 1Gb/s link back to the house which should be plenty for net access to the studio and any media you are pulling from your server over wifi.
 
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