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Comment by donatj | Hacker News Reader

Early this year I started redoing the backbone of my home network with 10 gb. Some of it's fiber, some of it's 10 gb copper Ethernet. It's been genuinely frustrating the weird incompatibilities between switches and SFP+ modules.

All my switches are MikroTik. My SFP+ modules are MikroTik, Ubiquiti, and some 3rd party ones from before I knew better.

I've had modules that will only run at gigabit in one switch but will give me the full 10 gb in another. I've had modules that refuse to work in one MikroTik switch but will happily work in a different MikroTik switch. I've just had a world of pain.

I've got everything basically working after months of fiddling and I'm inclined to just not… touch… anything.

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I've had great luck with 10gtek modules both with Mikrotik gear, with DACs, and one that is connected to an upstream juniper switch. I'm curious what modules were the most troublesom.

* I will note that the 10gb sfp+ modules from 10gtek on a Mikrotik just don't work.

Funnily enough, this 10gtek worked on one of my 3 switches, but I could only establish a gigabit connection. I returned it [1]

These 10gtek fiber modules on the other hand have worked flawlessly so far. [2]

This Mikrotik module would not establish a 10 gb link with my Thunderbolt dock no matter what I tried. Works fine with my servers though so I swapped it out.

I've pretty much resigned myself to just buying the full brand Ubiqitui SFP+ adapters [4] for converting to copper.

I recently purchased [5] to run to my living room, but I have not found the time/energy to do the run.

1. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KFBFL16

2. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08BP4M8LV

3. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078SNK1MY

4. https://store.ui.com/us/en/category/accessories-modules-fibe...

5. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CYC6P6KF

did you try to disable autonegotiation and force speed ? i think i had to do it a couple of times with copper

Yep. I actually had to do that to get the Ubiqiti one to work. It just did not work when I tried that with the Mikrotik adapter.

btw, if you are using 10gbe copper modules, take a look at their temperature. some of mine were getting to 92C i think. had to put a bunch of heatsinks on them

I put a couple of Noctua NF-14 over the top ventilation holes in my rack, with the silicone mounting thingies and the NA-FC1 PWM controller. They are almost silent in winter. The switch with 10Gb copper is under the fans.

i opened switch and put noctua inside to cool sfp cage that i added heatsink to, in addition to heatsinks on sfp+ module itself. it dropped temperature from 92c to 75c. year later i replaced it with fiber run.

Make sure you also pay attention to the distance rating of the SFP. I had a very similar experience with modules not working at the right speed sometimes. Turned out I was running 50 meters of cable over a 30 meter SFP. Got the correct one, and as low wattage rating as possible and it's been rock solid ever since.

I tried converting everything to copper as well but the copper DACs use a lot of power and ended up not working out due to the greatly increased power usage (mostly because the networking "closet" wasn't really designed for it). So beware if you're moving it to copper

I have a few SFP+ doing 10GbE over UTP from 10Gtek in a Mikrotik. They work perfectly, although hot (to be expected).

I have found that a fiber patch cable paired with two SFPs is cheaper and more power efficient than an equivalent UTP setup. This lead me to move to all fiber/DAC for 10Gb save for the 10Gb UTP link to my router that lacks SFP.

I have the 8 port 10Gb + 1 Gb from mikrotik and the UTP SFP's run stupid hot because they have to drive a cable at GHz speeds. The fiber and DAC (direct attach cable) SFPs are cool to the touch by comparison.

> * I will note that the 10gb sfp+ modules from 10gtek on a Mikrotik just don't work.

Weird. For the past three years, I've had 10Gtek 10gbit SFP+ optical modules in all of my Mikrotik switches [0] and they Just Work.

My switches are the CRS326-24G-2S+, and the SFPs were the "generic" versions. I wonder why yours were so troublesome.

[0] ...and (after fixing their eeproms) my Intel x520 NICs...

Similar... I only bought a single 8-port 10gb ethernet switch though... I have a couple devices with 10g nics including my NAS, the rest are 2.5g. I'm hoping that sooner than later, 10g ethernet gear pricing comes down closer to where 2.5g is today.

Have you had any issues with cooling? I have a 10GbE SFP+ module (made by Ubiquiti) that seems to have issues with overheating, I had to remove it to keep my network up consistently.

Copper 10gbe or fibre? All copper 10gbit devices produce a lot more heat than their 1gbit brethren.

It's one of the reasons I switched to running fiber even to desktops at home; it's like 1/10th the heat output.

Yep, copper! I’ve shied away from fiber at home just…because? But maybe for a trunk line it’s worth it. Thanks!

You want one of the latest ones rated for 100m (1.8W peak); the older 80m (2.5W) ones run hotter and the 30m ones are really hot.

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