Apple Airport Extreme instead of Cat 6?

[jtwrace]

I was told that (2) of the new Apple Airport Extremes would actually be quicker than a wired Cat 5 or 6 network. Is this true?

 

I was going to run some wire from my Extreme to NAS and to my Mini.

[coxhaus]

Routers don’t run faster than switches.

[Paul R]

They can be in some cases, but usually wired connections perform better, if they might be a tad bit "slower." There are more factors than speed involved.

 

Given that, I use Airport Extremes to bridge my home audio and video network from place to place, and use wired connections from the Airport Extremes to devices. I am quite pleased with that arrangement, and experience no issues with my entertainment sources. I like them a lot.

 

-Paul

 

 

I was told that (2) of the new Apple Airport Extremes would actually be quicker than a wired Cat 5 or 6 network. Is this true?

 

I was going to run some wire from my Extreme to NAS and to my Mini.

[coxhaus]

They can be in some cases, but usually wired connections perform better, if they might be a tad bit "slower." There are more factors than speed involved.

 

-Paul

 

Can you be more specific? I can’t think of an instance where routers are faster than a switch.

 

Using copper to a switch is the best way to go in a home. I am excluding fiber which is not necessarily better or worse just a different media with its own rules.

[Paul R]

Sure - a 10mbs second copper network will get handed it's lunch on a platter by a pair of Airport Extremes. Much faster data transfer, minimal packet queuing lags, and so forth.

 

Also, almost all switches these days acts as routers - at least L2L3 routers. VLANs for example, are usually routed about, and it doesn't slow the switches down one bit.

 

Routers are just switches with a little more intelligence and fewer ports. Think of Cisco ASAs vs Cisco 37xx switches.

 

-Paul

 

 

Can you be more specific? I can’t think of an instance where routers are faster than a switch.

 

Using copper to a switch is the best way to go in a home. I am excluding fiber which is not necessarily better or worse just a different media with its own rules.

[coxhaus]

Sure - a 10mbs second copper network will get handed it's lunch on a platter by a pair of Airport Extremes. Much faster data transfer, minimal packet queuing lags, and so forth.

 

Also, almost all switches these days acts as routers - at least L2L3 routers. VLANs for example, are usually routed about, and it doesn't slow the switches down one bit.

 

 

 

Routers are just switches with a little more intelligence and fewer ports. Think of Cisco ASAs vs Cisco 37xx switches.

 

-Paul

 

Not fair to compare 10mb hubs to modern routers as they are too old. I don’t even think they made 10mb switches. I only remember 10mb hubs. You can buy 1gig switches today for $30.

 

Just because a switch can do L3 routing does not classify it as a router. It is just a layer 3 switch. I have worked on many Cisco 6600 switches.

 

So I assume the switch is the way to go.

[junker]

Theoretically, an 802.11ac connection could outperform giga bit, but in the real-world that isn't going to happen. Check out some of the benchmarks / reviews on line. I saw some where they were only getting 30-40% under ideal line-of-sight conditions. This is with a single 802.11ac.

[Paul R]

I do not believe you have looked at the entire picture and thought it through. For example, look at the Ethernet port on most audio equipment, it is 10/100 at most. Gigabit ports are rare.

 

And an Airport Extreme will outperform a 100mbs wired network in most cases, wirelessly. Wired connections to an Airport Extreme are gigabit and easily perform on a par with any similar priced switch.

 

A Cisco 6600 switch can easily serve as a router. Slightly more modern versions, or even 37xx switches, are designed to act as ethernet routers.

 

At home it is usually a waste to buy switches instead of using the switch built into a good router. I say that even though I have a stack of Cisco 3750s in my running in my closet. (*sigh*)

 

As I said, I have very good results running Airport Extremes, with the caveat that I do attach the audio gear by ethernet.

 

-Paul

 

 

Not fair to compare 10mb hubs to modern routers as they are too old. I don’t even think they made 10mb switches. I only remember 10mb hubs. You can buy 1gig switches today for $30.

 

Just because a switch can do L3 routing does not classify it as a router. It is just a layer 3 switch. I have worked on many Cisco 6600 switches.

 

So I assume the switch is the way to go.

[coxhaus]

I always run a separate switch connected to one wire to my router. I want the router to route and the switch to switch. I don’t want the router being slowed down by doing switch duties.

 

My music server has a gig port. I don’t need that but gig ports receive priority in the grand scheme of things over slower port speeds.

 

I don’t see how 2 Airport Extremes would be faster than one Airport Extreme and a gig switch. CAT5E or CAT6 would be the preferred method for home networks. Copper is always going to be better than wireless as it more dependable.

[wdw]

I do not believe you have looked at the entire picture and thought it through. For example, look at the Ethernet port on most audio equipment, it is 10/100 at most. Gigabit ports are rare.

 

And an Airport Extreme will outperform a 100mbs wired network in most cases, wirelessly. Wired connections to an Airport Extreme are gigabit and easily perform on a par with any similar priced switch.

 

A Cisco 6600 switch can easily serve as a router. Slightly more modern versions, or even 37xx switches, are designed to act as ethernet routers.

 

At home it is usually a waste to buy switches instead of using the switch built into a good router. I say that even though I have a stack of Cisco 3750s in my running in my closet. (*sigh*)

 

As I said, I have very good results running Airport Extremes, with the caveat that I do attach the audio gear by ethernet.

 

-Paul

 

Paul,

 

Further to your comment above...do you feel an ethernet connection is sonically superior to the internal wifi in your mac...the reduction of noise, etc...

 

Cheers,

WDW

[junker]

I would personally run wire and turn off the wi-fi radio in the Mac. This is what I'm doing and don't have to worry about getting bottlenecked when something 802.11b hops on your network... .

 

I get 80MB/s from the Drobo in the network closet out to the MacMini in the living room. And that way I don't have to look at (or hear) the NAS.

 

 

 

I was told that (2) of the new Apple Airport Extremes would actually be quicker than a wired Cat 5 or 6 network. Is this true?

 

I was going to run some wire from my Extreme to NAS and to my Mini.

[jtwrace]

I would personally run wire and turn off the wi-fi radio in the Mac. This is what I'm doing and don't have to worry about getting bottlenecked when something 802.11b hops on your network... .

 

I get 80MB/s from the Drobo in the network closet out to the MacMini in the living room. And that way I don't have to look at (or hear) the NAS.

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]6892[/ATTACH]

Thanks. I've decided to do it this way (hardwired).

[Paul R]

The answer to that is rather tricky. The short answer is I think connecting ethernet to the audio gear, computer, DAC, whatever, produces a bit better sound.

 

The tricky part is that Ethernet is not inherently or intrinsicaly better than wireless, and the better performance is explained by better drivers and hardware for ethernet. The reason the drivers and hardware are better have to do with experience and cost, in my opinion.

 

A good wireless network will sound every bit as good as a wired network, again in my estimation. Building a good wireless network is a little more difficult, but not terribly so. Just takes a little more time and care.

 

I prefer a hybrid model right now. Wireless to bridge the network, and short wires from the bridge to theequipment needing connectivity. Cost effective that way.

 

Yours,

Paul

 

 

 

Paul,

 

Further to your comment above...do you feel an ethernet connection is sonically superior to the internal wifi in your mac...the reduction of noise, etc...

 

Cheers,

WDW

[Audio_ELF]

One option, if running cables all the way to your internet router is difficult, is to connect your NAS and your audio server directly to the same Airport Extreme (or similar "bridge) and allow that to talk wirelessly for the internet and other connections. That way the critical link is wired but it can be a lot more convenient that having to run a long cable to your router.

 

Hope that makes sense ...

 

Eloise

[Paul R]

A lot of people building home networks think the way you do, and with some justification. A $40 wireless router is not going to do that great of a job at anything, much less at multiple tasks. Higher end home equipment works more like professional gear and is capable of doing multiple tasks very well.

 

There are not many pure "switches" - in the way you are talking about switches - around today. Certainly anything that does VLANs has to have routing capability, and so forth. The high end switches are well beyond the home budget, or even beyond the budget of most small to medium sized businesses, unless they are in business to do telephone or data switching.

 

-Paul

 

 

I always run a separate switch connected to one wire to my router. I want the router to route and the switch to switch. I don’t want the router being slowed down by doing switch duties.

 

My music server has a gig port. I don’t need that but gig ports receive priority in the grand scheme of things over slower port speeds.

 

I don’t see how 2 Airport Extremes would be faster than one Airport Extreme and a gig switch. CAT5E or CAT6 would be the preferred method for home networks. Copper is always going to be better than wireless as it more dependable.

[intermediatic]

The new Airport Extremes are rated at up to 1.3gbps which is indeed faster than (nearly?) any consumer switch out there. But there are four problems. The first is that this is optimal speed, which you are unlikely to get. The reality will be lower. The second is that if you are connecting them to a music server or computer with a gigabit Ethernet port, they will be limited anyway. The third is that very few computers are now able to run wirelessly at the speeds the extremes are capable of. The third is that a wired network will have considerably less latency than a wireless network. So while you may (theoretically at least) get the same speeds over the wireless if you transfer a 1TB file, loading a 1mb Web page will feel faster and snappier on the wired connection. The fourth is that I have found the shielding in Cat 6 to make a difference in the blackness of a system. Mind you I also eliminated Trendnet Powerline adapters (work great for data but are terrible for audiophiles!), but at the same time, the amount of traffic over my wireless has decreased immensely. Cat 6 will also give you the ability to do crazy things like run your phone over a line or run HDMI over it or even audio from room to room (not sure of the quality on that). Install the Cat 6 yourself and throw out every switch that isn't in the main cabinet. I added 8 Cat 6 ports behind my media center and that was just enough (oppo, TV, mini, roku, appletv, telephone, and an xbox and airport extreme off to the side).

[coxhaus]

The new Airport Extremes are rated at up to 1.3gbps which is indeed faster than (nearly?) any consumer switch out there. But there are four problems. The first is that this is optimal speed, which you are unlikely to get. The reality will be lower. The second is that if you are connecting them to a music server or computer with a gigabit Ethernet port, they will be limited anyway. The third is that very few computers are now able to run wirelessly at the speeds the extremes are capable of. The third is that a wired network will have considerably less latency than a wireless network. So while you may (theoretically at least) get the same speeds over the wireless if you transfer a 1TB file, loading a 1mb Web page will feel faster and snappier on the wired connection. The fourth is that I have found the shielding in Cat 6 to make a difference in the blackness of a system. Mind you I also eliminated Trendnet Powerline adapters (work great for data but are terrible for audiophiles!), but at the same time, the amount of traffic over my wireless has decreased immensely. Cat 6 will also give you the ability to do crazy things like run your phone over a line or run HDMI over it or even audio from room to room (not sure of the quality on that). Install the Cat 6 yourself and throw out every switch that isn't in the main cabinet. I added 8 Cat 6 ports behind my media center and that was just enough (oppo, TV, mini, roku, appletv, telephone, and an xbox and airport extreme off to the side).

 

Consumer version switches have a much faster back plane than consumer routers which enables them to run a lot faster. The reason you are seeing better service running out of one central switch is all the ports are contained in the same back plane of the same switch. This makes overall performance better than running out of multiple switches. Once you go out the gig wire you have limited yourself.

[coxhaus]

A lot of people building home networks think the way you do, and with some justification. A $40 wireless router is not going to do that great of a job at anything, much less at multiple tasks. Higher end home equipment works more like professional gear and is capable of doing multiple tasks very well.

 

There are not many pure "switches" - in the way you are talking about switches - around today. Certainly anything that does VLANs has to have routing capability, and so forth. The high end switches are well beyond the home budget, or even beyond the budget of most small to medium sized businesses, unless they are in business to do telephone or data switching.

 

-Paul

 

Just because a switch is capable of vlans does not mean it is routing. You are confusing layer 2 traffic with layer 3 traffic. Vlans work on layer 2 traffic just the same as switches. Routers work at layer 3.

[Paul R]

Sorry- but I am not confusing this at all, I believe you are perhaps not totally up to speed with modern networking. The old OSI standard (the layers) has become more than a little blurred in the past decade or so. While VLANs are layer two constructs, they are most typically given an unique layer 3 address as well, and of course, that means that for a packet to travel from one VLAN to another, it would need to flow through a layer 3 device. Almost all modern switches have virtual interfaces to provide that device and are therefor, capable of and almost always configured to be routers.

 

With no loss of speed.

 

Indeed, one of the most typical mistakes with Cisco routers is a failure to remember to turn on ip routing. Quite irritating when traffic does not flow between VLANs!

 

As I said, the old OSI stuff is also just that - old - and most people today use the TCP/IP model (i.e. Link -> Internet -> Transport -> Application), even though the OSI model is still quite useful. But by your definition, a switch would be restricted to nothing more than a multi-port bridge with a MAC address database. And while any switch is certainly that, every modern switch I can think of today is quite a bit more than that, and incorporates routing.

 

Anyway, back to the discussion of wireless vs. wired, I do not hear differences between ethernet cables. Nor do I hear differences when I bridge the network wirelessly, say from the network closet upstairs to my system in the living room. Using AIrport Extremes, I do not have latency issues, but is mostly likely because the Airport Extreme has like five antenna in it, and has a really nice fast backplane. Empirically, it works here very very well.

 

The main switching and routing duties here are done by a small stack of Cisco 3750 switches, while firewall duty to the net is accomplished with a [redacted] that I got off ebay for an unbelievable price. Costs me ten times more than I paid for it to put the thing on Smartnet for a year.

 

The problem of course, is they are noisy and I am not thrilled with running cable between floors in a two story house with a tiny little attic.

 

-Paul

 

 

 

 

 

Just because a switch is capable of vlans does not mean it is routing. You are confusing layer 2 traffic with layer 3 traffic. Vlans work on layer 2 traffic just the same as switches. Routers work at layer 3.

[coxhaus]

Sorry- but I am not confusing this at all, I believe you are perhaps not totally up to speed with modern networking. The old OSI standard (the layers) has become more than a little blurred in the past decade or so. While VLANs are layer two constructs, they are most typically given an unique layer 3 address as well, and of course, that means that for a packet to travel from one VLAN to another, it would need to flow through a layer 3 device. Almost all modern switches have virtual interfaces to provide that device and are therefor, capable of and almost always configured to be routers.

 

With no loss of speed.

 

Indeed, one of the most typical mistakes with Cisco routers is a failure to remember to turn on ip routing. Quite irritating when traffic does not flow between VLANs!

 

As I said, the old OSI stuff is also just that - old - and most people today use the TCP/IP model (i.e. Link -> Internet -> Transport -> Application), even though the OSI model is still quite useful. But by your definition, a switch would be restricted to nothing more than a multi-port bridge with a MAC address database. And while any switch is certainly that, every modern switch I can think of today is quite a bit more than that, and incorporates routing.

 

Anyway, back to the discussion of wireless vs. wired, I do not hear differences between ethernet cables. Nor do I hear differences when I bridge the network wirelessly, say from the network closet upstairs to my system in the living room. Using AIrport Extremes, I do not have latency issues, but is mostly likely because the Airport Extreme has like five antenna in it, and has a really nice fast backplane. Empirically, it works here very very well.

 

The main switching and routing duties here are done by a small stack of Cisco 3750 switches, while firewall duty to the net is accomplished with a [redacted] that I got off ebay for an unbelievable price. Costs me ten times more than I paid for it to put the thing on Smartnet for a year.

 

The problem of course, is they are noisy and I am not thrilled with running cable between floors in a two story house with a tiny little attic.

 

-Paul

 

 

I am defiantly getting old and out dated age wise and network wise. The consumer level vlan switches that I have looked at require a router to route between vlans when the vlans are assigned to different networks. The switches I have looked at handle vlans but not the layer 3 routing. I am sure that will change at some point in the future.

 

PS

The cheapest layer 3 switch when I looked a year or so cost around $800 which I am not willing to spend for home use.

[Paul R]

You know, upon re-reading my repky to you, it came off waaaay more a**hole like than I ever meant it to be, which was not at all. Apologies- it just hit one of my "buttons" or something and I went into a "way more information than necessary" mode. It isn't often you can get into a debate in this subject area with someone who obviously knows what they are talking about, even if you disagree with them.

 

In any case, would you mind sharing some of the consumer grade switches you looked at? My knowledge of consumer grade network equipment is far from complete.

 

Yours,

Paul

 

 

I am defiantly getting old and out dated age wise and network wise. The consumer level vlan switches that I have looked at require a router to route between vlans when the vlans are assigned to different networks. The switches I have looked at handle vlans but not the layer 3 routing. I am sure that will change at some point in the future.

 

PS

The cheapest layer 3 switch when I looked a year or so cost around $800 which I am not willing to spend for home use.

[coxhaus]

I have home requirements for switches but I would like the niceties of a layer 3 switch. My most important requirement is a quiet fan. Even though I have a ¾ rack in my closet my wife and I do not want to work in our office with a blaring fan running on a switch.

 

I don’t remember the switch I just remember the price. So I setup a routed network in my house using 2 routers to isolate the wireless network. This helped a lot as I live in an old neighborhood with lots of wireless devices around. Even though they cannot connect to my wireless devices the APs have to respond to the initial requests for all wireless traffic. There are more networks I can setup when I purchase a layer 3 switch. A guess network would be nice. One of the issues I have is that I run a UTM device which is Untangle in transparent bridge mode. All my networks need to pass through this UTM device before hitting the outside router to go to the internet. I have had my wife’s cousin over with spy ware on her laptop and Untangle shuts her down and will not let the bad traffic pass.

 

So when the price comes down to around 2 or 3 hundred dollars I will buy one so I can enhance my network further.

If you know of any quiet layer 3 switches let me know. I just don’t keep up any more with networking.

[Paul R]

Easy Peasy - here's a little Cisco for just about $200. It has some limitations, but nothing that should be a real issue in a home network. (i.e. Number of VLANs, etc.)

 

Yours,

-Paul

 

 

 

Amazon.com: Cisco SG 300-10 (SRW2008-K9-NA) 10-Port Gigabit Managed Switch: Electronics

 

 

 

I have home requirements for switches but I would like the niceties of a layer 3 switch. My most important requirement is a quiet fan. Even though I have a ¾ rack in my closet my wife and I do not want to work in our office with a blaring fan running on a switch.

 

I don’t remember the switch I just remember the price. So I setup a routed network in my house using 2 routers to isolate the wireless network. This helped a lot as I live in an old neighborhood with lots of wireless devices around. Even though they cannot connect to my wireless devices the APs have to respond to the initial requests for all wireless traffic. There are more networks I can setup when I purchase a layer 3 switch. A guess network would be nice. One of the issues I have is that I run a UTM device which is Untangle in transparent bridge mode. All my networks need to pass through this UTM device before hitting the outside router to go to the internet. I have had my wife’s cousin over with spy ware on her laptop and Untangle shuts her down and will not let the bad traffic pass.

 

So when the price comes down to around 2 or 3 hundred dollars I will buy one so I can enhance my network further.

If you know of any quiet layer 3 switches let me know. I just don’t keep up any more with networking.

[Miska]

At home it is usually a waste to buy switches instead of using the switch built into a good router.

 

Practically these "home routers" just have a gigabit switch chip inside. Some of the SoCs used for these devices even have a switch and CPU on the same chip.

 

Biggest problem is number of ports, routers tend to have 4-5 switch ports, which is not enough for any larger modern house (two CAT-6 sockets per room).

[coxhaus]

Easy Peasy - here's a little Cisco for just about $200. It has some limitations, but nothing that should be a real issue in a home network. (i.e. Number of VLANs, etc.)

 

Yours,

-Paul

 

 

 

Amazon.com: Cisco SG 300-10 (SRW2008-K9-NA) 10-Port Gigabit Managed Switch: Electronics

 

I am sorry Paul. I should have said I need at least 16 ports. Ten ports would be tight and not enough if I decide to start running virtuals again.