Quanta LB4M 48-Port Gigabit Switch Discussion

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T_Minus

Build. Break. Fix. Repeat
Feb 15, 2015
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Those are the physical dimensions of the box itself, add another 1-2" at the back for safe operation of the plug, and ventilation space (the rear stock fans are intakes).

If your tight on space, I'd recommend ordering two L shaped power cords to save you an inch of space.
Not sure why I didn't think of this sooner :) for a couple applications, lol.
 

NetWise

Active Member
Jun 29, 2012
596
133
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Edmonton, AB, Canada
Probably not actually. "Maximum rail depth of 13". Total Usable Space of 16" front to back." Suggests there is only actually 13" between the mount points on the rails. Meaning at 15.5" it's going to stick out 2.5" further than the rear rails. If it is 16" internally with 13" rails it probably has 1.5" between the rail face and the door on either side. I don't recall of my quanta' are flush mount ears or if they're released an inch or so. But even with an l power cable it'd be horrible for airflow at the rear and cable bend radius up front.
 

confusingboat

New Member
Maybe I'll just flip the ears and take the door off. There's no way I'd be able to use the 10G uplink with that little space in front anyways, which is primarily why I'm looking at this switch in the first place. Gotta run a trunk from the patch panel switch to my TOR switch.
 

spyrule

Active Member
Ok, bare with me on this... I've used vlans a million times, never actually had to set one up from scratch though.

I can't seem to wrap my brain around the GUI on this switch...

Trying to create two vlans (say 100 and 200) and assign them to ports 1,2,3 on the switch (where ALL those ports transmit/receive is vid 100 and 200 packets). I then want to add my NAS port (port 50) with access to those vlans plus make sure it can still see the default vlan.

I'm using these two vlans solely for vMotion and FT from ESXi.

I get the concepts on how vlans works/benefits/drawbacks, but I've never actually set one up.... and this switch definitely doesn't make is outright obvious on how.
 

Scott Laird

Active Member
Aug 30, 2014
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I've never seen a switch GUI that doesn't make VLANs complicated. Use the command line, it's your friend. Log in, then type "show running-config" to see what's there, and "configure" to edit it. Once you exit from edit mode, run "write mem" or "write startup-config" or something similar (Cisco clones all run together in my head, sorry) to save for the next reboot.

My LB4m is unplugged right now, but I can probably plug it in and extract my working config tomorrow if it'd help.
 

T_Minus

Build. Break. Fix. Repeat
Feb 15, 2015
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I've never seen a switch GUI that doesn't make VLANs complicated. Use the command line, it's your friend. Log in, then type "show running-config" to see what's there, and "configure" to edit it. Once you exit from edit mode, run "write mem" or "write startup-config" or something similar (Cisco clones all run together in my head, sorry) to save for the next reboot.

My LB4m is unplugged right now, but I can probably plug it in and extract my working config tomorrow if it'd help.
I'm gonna guess it's not the techs making the GUI for a lot of things. And, those that are, it's noticeably awesome... or at-least their inner-department communication and standards are very high :) so the GUI is awesome. IE: Zyxel GUI is AWESOME, Synology is Awesome, NetGear is great but not awesome.

I've never tried GUI for the Cisco switches, etc, I have always just done CLI.

I am glad I didn't keep down the Cisco path though.
 

spyrule

Active Member
I've never seen a switch GUI that doesn't make VLANs complicated. Use the command line, it's your friend. Log in, then type "show running-config" to see what's there, and "configure" to edit it. Once you exit from edit mode, run "write mem" or "write startup-config" or something similar (Cisco clones all run together in my head, sorry) to save for the next reboot.

My LB4m is unplugged right now, but I can probably plug it in and extract my working config tomorrow if it'd help.

The problem I'm having is, even via CLI, it only seems to give me the options to configure vlans on ALL ports, not individual ports. It's really frustrating.

here's a screenshot of what I'm talking about:

 

IaaS

New Member
Feb 15, 2015
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The problem I'm having is, even via CLI, it only seems to give me the options to configure vlans on ALL ports, not individual ports. It's really frustrating.
Yeah, the LB4M is a frustrating piece of kit, but for the price I can't complain much. VLAN membership is configured in interface config mode on this switch, you can't assign ports to them in vlan config mode like you can on some other switches. I also don't think there is any way to bulk-assign ports to a single vlan with just one command on the CLI. It can be done in the GUI, but it takes a few minutes to figure out how it works, and you can easily break a working vlan config in the GUI if you check the wrong box... always backup your config before using the GUI VLAN tool.

I basically messed around with VLANs via the GUI and then studied the generated config to see how to configure them. I then reset the VLAN config via the GUI and manually configured all interfaces via the CLI. Here's a few snippets of one of my configs that seems to be working for the moment, I added some comments to each section:

Code:
!System Description "FASTPATH Switching"
!System Software Version "1.0.2.17"

!Setup 3 vlans with names
vlan database
vlan 99-100,120
vlan name 99 "OOB"
vlan name 100 "Admin"
vlan name 120 "Management"
exit

!VLAN99 untagged, VLAN100 tagged
interface 0/1
vlan pvid 99
vlan participation include 99-100
vlan tagging 100
exit

!VLAN99 untagged, edge port (RSTP/portfast)
interface 0/2
description 'PDU01'
spanning-tree edgeport
spanning-tree mst 0 cost 200000
spanning-tree mst 0 external-cost 200000
vlan pvid 99
vlan participation include 99
exit

!VLAN100 untagged, VLAN120 tagged, edge port (RSTP/portfast)
interface 0/20
description 'HV01_Gig_Pri'
spanning-tree edgeport
spanning-tree mst 0 cost 20000
spanning-tree mst 0 external-cost 20000
vlan pvid 100
vlan participation include 100,120
vlan tagging 120
exit
If you have a bunch of ports to configure you'll probably want to generate the config snippets using bash or something:

Code:
$ for i in `seq 20 40`; do echo -e "int 0/${i}\nvlan pvid 100\nvlan participation include 100,120\nvlan tagging 120\nexit"; done;

int 0/20
vlan pvid 100
vlan participation include 100,120
vlan tagging 120
exit
int 0/21
vlan pvid 100
vlan participation include 100,120
vlan tagging 120
exit
int 0/22
vlan pvid 100
vlan participation include 100,120
vlan tagging 120
exit
[...]
 

Levi

Member
Mar 2, 2015
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Hey guys, I'm looking for a cheap 10gb switch for home use. I tried taking my server and putting 10gb cards into it and turning it into a router but I never got the performance I wanted. Is this still the cheapest 10gb switch? Would you recommend it and at what price? I'm hooking up a power edge and 2 or 3 clients. All with SFP+ DAC 10gb NIC's
 

NetWise

Active Member
Jun 29, 2012
596
133
43
Edmonton, AB, Canada
So I know I'm being pedantic, but neither is a '10gbe switch'. They're 1gbe switches with 10gbe uplinks, which is why the number of ports is low. For a very very small amount of ports they might get by. The HP you linked to would require Procurve Module Al 2PORT Sfp 10GBE Amazon.com: Procurve Module Al 2PORT Sfp 10GBE: Electronics
Amazon.com: Procurve Module Al 2PORT Sfp 10GBE: Electronics added to it for 2 more ports - and you're in the same boat as the LB4M only have spent $1500+.

Others may have some better suggestions, but for an 'inexpensive', actual 10gbe switch, I'd recommend a Dell PC8024f or an IBM G8124f. Both of mine I got lucky and found for about $1000 USD, but they're like hens teeth now.

If anyone else has a good suggestion, I'm still looking for more so if be curious as well.

But I think we're straying off the LB4M topic...?
 

Levi

Member
Mar 2, 2015
76
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Since I'm using DAC's I dont need the modules? right? The cables just plug in into the slot?
 

Levi

Member
Mar 2, 2015
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It was my understanding that the uplinks could be configured just like a regular port. I could be wrong, I'm new too this but I did get 10gb working in my home, just looking for a better setup