Linksys 16 Port Gigabit PoE Network Switch

This is a review of the Linksys 16 Port Business Desktop Gigabit POE Switch. (Metal Cased.)

A review and instructional – informative article in one!

Summary – I am using this and could not be happier. My home Ethernet network has been growing as I have been moving my WIFI devices to hard wire for reliability, speed and security reasons. Some of my Ethernet items are POE such as my VOIP phone and IP Cameras when most of my other devices are normal non POE Ethernet. I wanted a switch that was future speed –gigabit that would allow me to grow even further with my home network. The switch is 100% plug and play. No drivers to install, no interface to mess with. Simply plug your uplink cable into this and then plug in your other devices. It should also be noted it does not get hot, is silent and does not require special venting. (Max temp is 122 degrees F.)

Note – Your uplink cable – feed from your router can be connected to any port on this switch. Some switches have a dedicated port, but this one does not. I recommend a port on the right side so that you do not use up the more valuable POE ports.

What I like about this switch if that you have the ports divided.

The ports labeled 1-8 are your POE ports. This means they are the ports which can connect your POE devices. The total power you have available in the 8 ports is 80watts (77 according to some reading.). When your POE devices consume less than 67 of the watts, the light on the front left of the switch marked POE Max will remain off. When your power consumption exceeds 67watts, it will light up an amber color.

There is a blue led on the left side of the switch which glows when the unit is on and functioning.

The ports labeled 9 through 16 are non POE ports. (Normal Ethernet ports.)

In terms of speeds-connections, this is a gigabit POE switch and offers up to 1000mb/s and a non-blocking bandwidth of 32Gbps.
In terms of the leds aside each port, here is the quick run down of the colors you may see.

Ports 1-8.
Left side will be amber for 10/100 or green for 1000mb/s connections.
Right side will be green if the device is using POE from the port.

Ports 9-16
These only have leds on the left side. Left side will be amber for 10/100 or green for 1000mb/s connections.

In terms of power use, this is on par for any poe switch. The last switch I used drew 180w or 1.8A. This one only draws 1.5A at 100-240V and outputs 54V at 1.66A DC to the switch. (So yes, you can use this on a 220V service.)

Mounting can be done using two screws-sinks (included.) As this has two screw mounts on the bottom, you can hang vertically or horizontally.

Overall this is performing like a champ, rock solid and would recommend. Linksys has never let me down ever now that I can recall.

As with all my reviews, I will update this review should there be issues that develop with ongoing use.

Der Umbau der Netzwerkinfrastruktur im Haus stand an.
Gekauft wurde der AC-Pro Accespoint von Ubiquiti(Ubiquiti Networks UAP-AC-PRO, weiß) und POE wurde damit ein Thema. Außerdem waren vorher ein WLAN-Router und ein 8 Port Gigabitswitch installiert. Der wachsende Bedarf nach mehr LAN Ports (NAS, Raspi, …) zeigte das Dilemma von immer mehr benötigten Steckdosen für die zersplitterte vorhandene Installation auf.

Aktuell ist nur noch eine Steckdose für das Netzwerk erforderlich, der 16 Port Switch inkl. 8 Port POE erleichtert die Verkabelung der Netzwerkinfrastruktur, ohne separate Netzteile.

PRO’s:
• die Datenrate entspricht dem Gigabit Standard, keine Limitierung spürbar
• passive Kühlung
• fairer Preis
• gute Kompatibilität (POE)
• passive LAN Komponenten an POE Ports anschließbar
• kompakte Bauweise
• Wandmontage möglich
Negativ:
• blaue Power LED nicht abschaltbar

Gekauft im November 2017 und bis heute ohne Probleme durchgelaufen.

Great product, fast shipping, great seller!

Purchased new here on Amazon on 6/23/2019 and here I am on 10/2/2019 with a dead switch. It went out at a critical time, as was providing power to my surveillance cameras. Once I arrived at our second home, only the blue power light was illuminated and none of the ports were. Unplugged the power supply & plugged it back in, and same thing. Blue power light illuminated, and ethernet port lights just blipped briefly. Switch was very hot too, and the second or third time I tried unplugging/plugging the power supply, I heard it sizzle inside and
a burnt smell was coming from it. When it worked, it worked fine as kept a solid network connection for my cameras & alarm system. Based on all the reviews of trying to deal with tech support to get a dead switch replaced, it’s probably not worth my time, as no need to go thru diagnostics with a switch, that won’t do anything more than illuminate the power on light.

Easy to use, self-configuring system. My network includes #5 PC, #1 NAS and several multimedia units like BD players, etc. I always used Gigabit speed switches, segmenting the connections to improve the speed between the units but after one of the switches broke, I decided to replace all with a single more powerful switch.
I have and I had other Linksys units that proven to be reliable and effective in the years; this is the reason for the brand choice, the model is not a cheap one but looking at the results it was worthwhile to spend some bucks more.

It’s a PoE switch. It routes packets and provides power to devices that ask for it. Only 8 of the ports on the 16-port switch are PoE, which isn’t atypical for a switch and is noted in the item description. The only thing you’d need to really consider is that this is an active switch, meaning that devices which require a passive PoE supply aren’t going to work. But I consider that to be a good thing, as you won’t fry your devices if you accidentally plug something non-PoE into a PoE port.

I did have my switch device to randomly stop providing power, which Linksys did replace under the lifetime warranty. But it took me like an hour on the phone with them to get them to agree to replace it, and at first they tried to blame my ISP for the switch not supplying power! To their credit though, they were able to ship the replacement before I boxed up and sent back the original, meaning I didn’t have to go days without a switch.