I am now a proud owner of a Juniper EX2200-C POE compact switch!

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Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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This thing is beautiful and built like a tank. Fanless, and a huge heatsink on the back.

Anyone else have one of these? any 'good to know' advisories?

Originally I was going to send POE out from our POE WIFI switch connected to our core switch, but decided to throw another POE switch onto the WIFI switch, just love to compartmentalise things.

Will definitely report back with some photos after I've installed it in our utility wardrobe.
 

Evan

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Jan 6, 2016
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Looks very much like the Cisco Catalyst 3560CX series, these are cool, some can provide POE and be also be powered by POE.

Cisco version also has some with pairs of 10G SFP+ of RJ45 mGig

I like that kind of switch for home use a lot ! But pricy.
 

Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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I try to avoid buying something which is unjustifiably vastly energy inefficient, but I try to balance out my purchases based on reliability and environmental conditions... last thing I want to do is stick a high power fanless POE switch into a cramped cupboard if it'll give up the ghost not too long after installation... for this requirement and heavy research, I settled for the Juniper, apparently they were specifically designed to operate in heavy-load less-than-ideal environmental conditions (not every business wants to run long lengths of cabling from cold server rooms and not every business has a cold server room to begin with)... so from an enterprise level the Juniper EX2200-C fit the bill perfectly... so then the argument of 'it costs more than an equivalent HPE or Cisco SOHO range or Ubiquiti or even MicroTik' comes up... and with some back to back debating with the missis, we decide that it would be wiser to invest upfront in something which fits the bill not just technologically but also environment/energy/reliability record etc... and when you balance out the whole debate you kind of realise that the cost is quite fairly justified considering the peace of mind one gets... last thing we want is our whole security/electronic-gate/video-intercom system to fall apart because of a switch deciding to fail on us... I've read a fair few internet posts on the Ubiquiti failure rates and the Cisco gas-guzzling mentalities and the loud HPs... plus a single ball-bearing fan simply doesn't make sense as in it lacks redundancy, one mechanical part can become the weakest link and lead to a catastrophic failure etc...

In the end it is I'm sure you agree, price = functionality = peace of mind... if I was going to have it up in the cold attic then I would have just gone with a HP, reliable yes, but far from quiet.
 

sth

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Oct 29, 2015
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I use a couple of 2300c’s, solid silent switches and I really like Junos too. Available more reasonably used too.
Enjoy.
 

Evan

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Jan 6, 2016
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Had some experience with Ubiquiti failures :-/
Is anybody saying the Cisco I mentioned is not reliable ?
So far they seem to be and look built to last, heavy and fanless. But if a energy consumer though with ~25-30 watts idle but it’s a performance L3 switch.
I didn’t see any specs on consumption of the Juniper switch but can’t imagine too much different but would be nice if it was less.
30w for a dozen ports at 1G is silly high I think but all the good performance L3 switches seem to be like this.
 

Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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I got it up and running, upgraded the fw to 15.1R2.9 and installed the webgui, just been setting up some static routes/vlans and whatnot and appears to be working well, still can't get over how heavy duty this little beast is.

Any super-gents who can shove the latest fw in my general direction? (much appreciated)
 

Blinky 42

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I have the non-poe version and they are nice silent switches but j-web is even slower on them than normal due to the underpowered mgmt CPU, but once up and running they are great if a bit warm. Once you get used to it the command line is far faster and more powerful than JWeb anyway.

Note that JTAC still recommends "Junos 12.3R12-S12" for them according to Juniper Networks - 12.3R12 Recommended Release for EX2200 and EX2200-C and Juniper Networks - JTAC Recommended Junos Software Versions because the switch only has 512M of memory and 15.1 is a bigger image than Junos 12.x
 
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Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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Oh gosh yes the jweb is no good for constant tweaking most definitely not. However the gui does one thing the cli doesn't do, and that's its nice dashboard which presents very useful information polled every interval. Though I've noted some smarties have written scripts to pull the data off into their own programmed dashboards, might look into that, there are some projects floating around on github to that effect.

Yes I did see that they don't recommend anything over 12.3 on the EX2200 series, but I understood it to be more a warning for those who are working on larger topologies, I'm simply running a few security devices off of it, it's more just a fancy hub at the end of a series of switches, I'm currently at 64% ram usage so should be fine :)
 

scline

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Apr 7, 2016
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DM'd you - looks like Juniper removed links to the 15.1 versions due to memory limitations. I am asking if they can send me the 15.1R7 version (most recent it sounds like). Looking at those articles I would recommend using 12.3 unless there is a feature 15.1 brings. Mainly due to bugfixes and updates only being applied to 12.3 for EX2200's as 15.1 appears to be dropped support-wise.

Remove those nasty static routes btw - get some dynamic routing going :) its a wonderful switch and platform - use it! POE firmware is not updated when you upgrade the switch OS, be sure to check and keep it up to date following this guide.

If or when you do enable dynamic routing take a look at the licensing model and how to stop your logs from filling up - https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/juniper-switch-licensing.18852/

I have used EX2200's and EX2300's for some time so if you have any questions please let me know!
 

747builder

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Dec 17, 2017
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DM'd you - looks like Juniper removed links to the 15.1 versions due to memory limitations. I am asking if they can send me the 15.1R7 version (most recent it sounds like). Looking at those articles I would recommend using 12.3 unless there is a feature 15.1 brings. Mainly due to bugfixes and updates only being applied to 12.3 for EX2200's as 15.1 appears to be dropped support-wise.

Remove those nasty static routes btw - get some dynamic routing going :) its a wonderful switch and platform - use it! POE firmware is not updated when you upgrade the switch OS, be sure to check and keep it up to date following this guide.

If or when you do enable dynamic routing take a look at the licensing model and how to stop your logs from filling up - https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/juniper-switch-licensing.18852/

I have used EX2200's and EX2300's for some time so if you have any questions please let me know!
I have a bunch of images for these switches. feel free to PM me if you need any. i have access to most ALL JunOS images for the SRX and EX-series switches. anybody is welcome to PM me if you need Juniper images.
 

Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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Remove those nasty static routes btw - get some dynamic routing going :) its a wonderful switch and platform - use it!
Yes I have been... locked myself out of it too... twice!:D
I'm getting the hang of the whole command hierarchy, it's like a sort of xml without the '<>'s and closing tags.

I was just wondering, is there a way to snapshot the current config into a preset of sorts, and then after flaffing around and committing a load of 'learning' tweaks, to then just revert to any given personally stored preset?
 

Blinky 42

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Junos stores the previous committed configurations in the filesystem and you can roll back to any of them pretty easy. You can rollback to go back just one or rollback 4 to go back 4 commits.

Look down in Managing Configurations - TechLibrary - Juniper Networks for examples. Rolling back a few steps is handy when you try something complex and f it all up (not that I have ever done that ;)) - do a

Code:
rollback ?
and it will show you the previous configs and when they were made so it is easy to go back before you caused problems. You can do the same in JWeb as well.
 
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Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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oh I know of rollback, I meant after a few commits to go back to a particular state... I know I can back up the config file manually, but that would require a reboot, meaning network going offline for a good few minutes (boy do these Junipers take a while to boot up!). I guess what I'm asking for doesnt really exist in the world of switches but doesn't hurt to ask :D

EDIT: re-read your message, so I can just rollback to a much older version? without having to 'rollback' through each one?
 

Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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wonder if one can 'name' the versions for rollback, so I remember which one it is rather than sweeping through a long essay of configuration. I suppose a pencil and paper will have to do.
 

Blinky 42

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You don't need to reboot to do a rollback? Just rollback and commit and blam yer done. You can also just copy the config file off the switch in a slew of diff ways, or setup a cron job to pull down the current config every hour or similar.
If you want to change to a diff firmware version you need to reboot, and you can have default and rescue firmware images setup.

You can put comments in the config (look at the link above) to note what you were doing. And you can always drop into BSD and diff thigns there to compare quick
 
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Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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Perfect!! Thank you!

(RTFM is not my strong point, always long winded, I'm one of those who can walk straight into a surgical operation room and do a heart bypass, as long as I have google next to me and a forum or two of lads who've been there before me) :D
 

scline

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Apr 7, 2016
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So two things, take a look at commit confirm, this command will give your device the ability to automatically roll back the configuration if you do not commit the changes. This is so you do not have to console or power-cycle the device in the event you lock yourself out.

For example you want to test a change and in the event you don't confirm it with an SSH command it will automatically rollback after 2 minutes.

Code:
root@las1-ex3400-sw1# show | diff
[edit system]
-  name-server {
-      8.8.8.8;
-      8.8.4.4;
-  }

root@las1-ex3400-sw1# commit confirmed 2
commit confirmed will be automatically rolled back in 2 minutes unless confirmed
commit complete

# commit confirmed will be rolled back in 2 minutes
{master:0}[edit]
root@las1-ex3400-sw1#

# commit confirmed will be rolled back in 2 minutes
{master:0}[edit]
root@las1-ex3400-sw1#

# commit confirmed will be rolled back in 2 minutes
{master:0}[edit]
root@las1-ex3400-sw1#

root@las1-ex3400-sw1# commit check
configuration check succeeds

{master:0}[edit]
root@las1-ex3400-sw1#

{master:0}[edit]
root@las1-ex3400-sw1#
For rolling back changes you can roll back up to however many you configured, normally 15 or 30 by default.

Code:
root@las1-ex3400-sw1# rollback ?
Possible completions:
  <[Enter]>            Execute this command
  0                    2019-03-22 17:31:43 PDT by root via cli commit confirmed, rollback in 2mins
  1                    2019-03-16 23:24:18 PDT by root via cli
  2                    2019-03-16 23:23:23 PDT by root via cli
  3                    2019-02-16 18:13:49 PST by root via cli
  4                    2019-02-16 18:12:03 PST by root via cli
  5                    2019-02-16 18:11:32 PST by root via cli
  6                    2019-02-16 18:10:03 PST by root via cli
  7                    2019-02-16 18:09:07 PST by root via cli
  8                    2019-02-15 14:33:46 PST by root via other
  9                    2019-02-15 00:58:12 PST by root via cli
And another good command for diffing exactly what each rollback would do to your system
Code:
show | diff rollback <rollback_number>
Oh and when displaying configurations on the device, sometimes I find the XML format hard to read (from a copy-paste configuration point of view). Viewing the configurations as set-commands can be super helpful when learning the CLI

Code:
show configuration | display set
 
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747builder

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Dec 17, 2017
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"commit confirm" is your best friend just as "commit check" is.

guess ive been lucky and never locked out of any juniper stuff even while learning.
 

Dreece

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Jan 22, 2019
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I find the best way to learn is to push your limits to force failure, because it is only then that you stand taller and rise higher, but if one already knew of commit confirm then locking oneself out is impossible really.

I knew a guy 20 years or so back who used to work at Xerox, he managed to "rm -rf /" on classic unix... god knows how someone can even make that mistake. Needless to say he wasn't employed long after that. A commit-confirm may have saved him his career LOL