PoE router with OpenWrt or plain PoE switch?

Hardware Questions and Recommendations
1

Hello,

I'm planning to segregate my network into multiple VLANs and I need switch for PoE cameras. Since I decided to go full OpenWrt for my network (all AP, router/AP and modem have OpenWrt flashed), I would like to continue with this direction.

So my question is, should I buy PoE router and flash OpenWRT on it or should I just buy plain PoE switch instead?

Thanks.

2

That all depends I guess? OpenWrt recently acquired support for a few switches with the addition of the realtek target. I'm running two of those - a ZyXEL GS1900-10HP as my PoE switch and a Netgear GS108T v3 with PoE PD. I have a ZyXEL GS1900-8HP v1 as a test device.

Very happy with it.

You can find those for a decent price nowadays. Mind you the GS108T v3 doesn't do PoE itself, but I think its GS110TPP v1 sibling and others do.

3

Thanks for reply.

I actually do own ZyXEL GS1900-8HP! I didn't know OpenWrt has added support for swtiches. Is that switch running well on OpenWrt?

4

And what about non-PoE switches? Is there any supported by OpenWrt?

5

That's my backup switch so it's not seeing heavy use, but the hardware is very similar to the GS1900-10HP.

The GS108T v3 is a 'normal' switch.

6

Support for the ZyXEL GS1900-8 (without PoE) was just added to master.

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7

What SFP can I use on the Zyxel GS1900-10p PoE switch? I'm thinking ethernet cable/cat6/5 because that's what I have in my house. :slight_smile:

8

I have tested mine with assorted SX and Base-T SFPs. Original Cisco and Fiberstore. I believe anything standard should work. Exotic stuff like GPON etc might have issues (as usual - mostly due to non-compliance).

Speed/duplex negotiation and other phy features works perfectly (for copper SFPs). And you have all the usual Linux SFP gizmos, like a hwmon device with sensors etc.

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