What is a Gigabit Switch and why your HOME NEEDS this!
What is an Unmanaged POE Gigabit Switch?
That is what you get when you use up all your LAN ports on your router but you still want to plug more devices into your network. But what does that even mean and will Gigbabit provide you faster internet access?
Here’s what you need to know:
How to expand your Network with a Gigabit Switch
We love our WiFi but we know that the best connectivity is to hard-wire your ethernet cable into the router. This is something you need to do whenever possible. However, we quickly run out of LAN ports and when happens, you need to get yourself a switch. The problem is that after doing a quick search you quickly discover that there are so many options using terms like Unmanaged and POE – so what do all these mean?
Let’s break it down you know what to look out for when you buy yours:
Manage vs Unmanaged
You get managed and unmanaged switches. A Managed Switch means you are able to manage your network with software. That is really something that typically IT Engineers and Security professionals require. For most of our home networks, this is a complicated overkill.
What we want is an Unmanaged Switch. This is a solution that allows you to simple plug the switch in and it instantly works expanding your network. You don’t have to configure anything.
Power Over Ethernet – POE
POE stands for Power over Ethernet. When you get devices such as security cameras or a VoIP phone or Access points they require power in order to work. This really limits where you can position these devices as you need to be close to a wall power outlet. You then connect the ethernet cable to the device and run it into the router or switch.
A switch that has POE means that the compatible POE devices gets their power from the same ethernet cable! Therefore, you no longer need to find a power outlet which means you have much more freedom to position your device where you actually want it.
Gigabit
This means that the Switch can move data around your networks at 10, 100, or 1000Mbps. This is what you need to handle all that data from all your devices on your network.
Will a Gigabit Switch give you faster internet speed?
No.
While the data from your computer or PlayStation will flow at up to 1000Mbps to the switch, then to your modem, your internet speed is limited by your ISP. So if you only buy a 10Mbps connection, you will get only get at most 10Mbps.
Where gigabit does an excellent job is in reducing congestion on a busy network and where you notice the biggest difference is when you transfer large files to your NAS backup device and when you stream 4k videos your local media server.
Fun Fact: I have been using the 5 Port Switch and the 8 Port Switch that I was sent. So far so good!
