[geeks] Seems like low-cost Cisco 10/100 switches are available

[Nadine Miller]

nate at portents.com wrote:
>> Cisco + Sun HME (and maybe other) NICs...many, and as recently as '05.
>> Cisco + Apple G4 NIC (don't recall the NIC chipset).
> 
> Out of curiosity, how old was the Cisco gear?  I recently read this on
> wikipedia, but it doesn't indicate when Cisco cleaned up their act:
> 
> "The first version of the autonegotiation specification, IEEE 802.3u, was
> open to different interpretations. Although most manufacturers implemented
> this standard in one way, some others, including network giant Cisco,
> implemented it in a different way... The debatable portions of the
> autonegotiation specifications were eliminated by the 1998 release of
> 802.3. This was later followed by the release of IEEE 802.3ab in 1999. The
> new standard specified that gigabit Ethernet over copper wiring requires
> autonegotiation."

Couldn't speak to the age.  It first happened back <'01, when I worked 
for Cisco; that was on the engineering server network, so it was 
probably Cat5K's.  The last time it happened was at one of my $gov jobs 
around '05 on their desktop network.  I know that it was Sun (Sun Blade 
  with the crappy on-board IDE, pretty sure it was an HME NIC) & Apple 
NIC specific, because the x86 box under my desk did not have the same 
problem.  I wasn't privy to the details of the Cisco side because 
<sarcasm>after all, senior Solaris sys admins know nothing about 
networks.</sarcasm>

Out of curiosity, for those of you who have worked in large 
organizations where the "network" team is a complete and separate entity 
from the "sys admin" team, has the network team ever been responsive, 
reliable, and, in general, competent and pleasant to work with?

=Nadine=