unmanaged switch with mini-gbic and gigabit fiber tranceivers 1

[bithead9]

I have 2 Zyxel gs-1100-24 with 2 gbic ports. When I hook the gbic up along with the transceivers they light up appear to work and then shortly thereafter turn off. Is that a power save feature of the 802.113az ? If I disconnect the transceiver it does not light backup and start working. I thought that you can have backup connections on most rack mount switches these days. (with built in span tree and flood protection, etc.) Here is a simple diagram on how it is connected:
The transceivers are 10/100/1000 auto neg and have been in service working for months so I know they are fine.

Switch1 port1------ > fiber transceiver ------------------ fiber transceiver -- Router1
Switch1 gbic port25 -----> Switch2 gbic port25
Switch2 gbic port25 -----> Switch1 gbic port25
Switch2 port1 -----------------------------------------> fiber transceiver -- Router1

The idea here is that either switch would get to the router if either the gbic or the transceiver failed. Shouldn't the switch2 be able to use either path ? port1 or gbic to get to either switch1 or router1 (with the intent to provide LAN and WAN access). Power cycling the switch did not help. Even though they are hot pluggable, I tried that. I also tried swappting the xmit/reveive on the gbic fiber pairs. no help there.

 

[bithead9]

Some details on the Zyxel switch:
Inactive link detection. The inactive link detection function automatically reduces power usage when inactive links or devices are detected. The ZyXEL GS1100 Series can adjust power consumption according to link status and the number of active network devices.
•IEEE 802.3 10BASE-T Ethernet
•IEEE 802.3u 100BASE-TX Ethernet
•IEEE 802.3ab 1000BASE-T Ethernet
•IEEE 802.3az EEE support
•IEEE 802.3x flow control
•IEEE 802.3z 1000BASE-X
•IEEE 802.1p CoS
•IEEE 802.3af PoE (GS1100-8HP)

 

[jimbopalmer]

There is no mention of Spanning Tree Protocol in the documentation I found, (User guide or Spec Sheet) but there is something called Broadcast storm Control. I suspect you have demonstrated it.

To use multiple ports, you want STP or some sort of Link Aggregation, which is also not mentioned in the documents, both usually require some management features.

You are unlikely to get what you want in an unmanaged switch.

I tried to remain child-like, all I achieved was childish.

Tsar of all the Rushers

 

[bithead9]

Hey Jimbo thanks for that quick reply! I really thought STP was built into most switches these days. But I guess not I can always do a manual swap of the ports for now. Next time to upgrade these I will either get a managed switch or one with STP. Are there any low cost gigabit switches (with mini-GBIC ports) you might recommend ?

 

[jimbopalmer]

STP is fairly bad unless managed, the algorithm defaults to the Lowest MAC Address being the root of the tree, but the lowest MAC address is almost always the oldest, least capable piece of equipment you own.

You want your newest network device to be the root of your network in most instances.

My clients can just barely afford 100 meg parts from ebay, sorry.

I tried to remain child-like, all I achieved was childish.

Tsar of all the Rushers