Switch recommendation for 10GB home network

[thimplicity]

Hi everyone,
I am planning to expand my home network and move it (or at least parts of it) to 10 GB. Currently, I have the following setup:

1. Laundry room: in-wall media enclosure (see picture here):

• Modem (Spectrum)
• Switch (Ruckus ICX 7150-C12P)
• Router (AliExpress mini PC) running pfSense. The device also runs pi-hole as well as some essential homelab services
• Unifi CloudKey
• Lutron bridge (For Lutron Caseta light switches)
• The builder terminated all cables into this enclosure. All rooms are equipped with Cat5e and I am also running a few cameras through PoE.

2. Office Closet: Homelab server connected via a single 1GB Cat5e cable hosting multiple VMs and containers (homelab stuff).

I am planning to extend my homelab with more kubernetes nodes, UPS etc and I came up with the following requirements for the switches from a port and connection speed perspective.

For the laundry room:


I am planning to run two fiber cables from the laundry room into the office closet so that I have the option to move to 25GB or 40GB in the (far) future, but I also read that fiber runs less hot, has better latency and consumes less power.

Office Closet (server room):


I would like to future-proof it (as far as that is possible and makes sense with technology of course), but I also would like to have an energy-efficient setup that is as quiet as possible. Based on what I read here on reddit in the past days and weeks, my favorite brands are so far Unifi and Mikrotek, but I am open to additional ideas. I really like the Unifi UI and it would integrate nicely with the existing NVR and Camera setup. Unfortunately, they do not seem to have an affordable PoE switch with enough ports for 10GBe. Based on my research, I have the following switches shortlisted:

• Unifi Enterprise 24 PoE ($800 - laundry room, not enough 10GB ports, but 2.5GB ports)
• Unifi USW-Aggregation ($540 total - server room - I would need 2)
• Mikrotik CRS328-24P-4S+RM ($500 - laundry room)
• Mikrotik CRS317-1G-16S+RM ($500 - server room)

Maybe y'all have an even better idea how to achieve the setup. As you can see in the picture, the space in the media enclosure is rather limited, so the setup needs to fit in there. A standard 1U switch would fit.

Thanks for some thoughts!

 

[Sean Ho]

ICX6450 for the laundry room and 6610 for the server closet?

 

[thimplicity]

ICX6450 for the laundry room and 6610 for the server closet?

The 6450 looks pretty good and one can mod the fans. Power consumption is also comparable to what Unifi or Mikrotik does. Unfortunately the fan mod does not seem to be possible for the 6610. I am not willing to have a jet being close to me though . If I checked correctly, they are only capable of running a relative old firmware. One good thing would be that I am relatively familiar with the firmware and CLI, as Brocade = Ruckus.

 

[Sean Ho]

I have fan-modded a 6610 with a $3 555 signal gen / tach emulator wired to both the PSU and the fan tray, then using 2x14cm quiet fans on top of the switch. A couple threads on here have pics from others who have done the same. It does run hot (especially the PoE variants), so it still needs a good amount of airflow.

 

[newabc]

brocade/ruckus L3 managed switches have much more security features than mikrotik/ubiquiti ones. But the later ones have some warranty if the user buys the new ones. If don't mind the 2nd-hand, personally I will prefer brocade.

 

[mattventura]

With Mikrotik, you have to check actual street prices rather than MSRP. Sometimes it's above, usually below. You can probably get the CRS317 for more like $450, or step up to a CRS324-24s-2q for $570 or so.