Qnap qsw-1208

The QNAP QSW-1208-8C is the manufacturer 's first unmanaged 10 Gbps connectivity switch. This equipment is a commitment to maximum speed at the best price, with a total of 12 useful ports under the 10GBASE-T and NBASE-T standards. It offers connectivity both in copper with RJ45, and fiber optics with SFP +, thanks to two combo panels of both standards together with another independent SFP + panel to achieve a maximum routing capacity of 240 Gbps.

This switch is clearly geared towards high-speed network links where server-type nodes such as high-end NAS and clients with high data transfer rates are presumably used, for example, NVMe SSDs. In addition, we will test it with the QNAP QXG-10G1T 10G network card with Aquantia chip, and Cat.6e cable to see its maximum capacity.

Before continuing, we thank QNAP for their trust in us as a partner, by lending us this Switch to do their analysis.

QNAP QSW-1208-8C technical characteristics

Unboxing

The QNAP QSW-1208-8C has arrived (and will arrive) in a neutral cardboard box with the most professional style possible, and its main face printed with a sketch of the switch with its different ports and its main features in a schematic way. The opening is case type.

Inside, we find the main product tucked inside a thick plastic bag and in turn protected on its sides by a thick polyethylene foam mold. In a small cabin on the right, we tend to the other accessories.

The bundle consists of the following elements:

• Switch 10G QNAP QSW-1208-8C Power cord Rubber feet for surface mounting Metal brackets for rack mounting Mounting screws Instruction manual

Indeed the manufacturer offers us two possibilities in terms of mounting, the traditional one on a table with its respective legs, or mounting on a rack or directly on the wall with the two included brackets. In principle we will only have the screws available to fix the brackets to the switch, while the others should be included in the rack cabinet or buy wall screws.

Exterior design

Well this QNAP QSW-1208-8C is presented to us with a purely traditional design as is understandable for a team focused on being mounted on racks. It is a rectangular box completely made of sheet metal with a “QNAP Gray” paint coating. The measurements we have of the set are 285 mm wide, 233 mm deep and only 43 mm thick.

Indicate that this upper part will be the one that we must disassemble to access the interior. The screws are located on the rear side, and then we see it in the screenshots.

On the bottom side we will not find anything relevant from the team. Only the 4 round marks for gluing the legs included in the bundle. Here we also find the corresponding manufacturer's label.

In the back area of ​​the QNAP QSW-1208-8C we have the two screws that we have mentioned to open the switch and the following ports:

• 3-pin 230V power connector RS232 serial port for access to firmware and programming Kensington slot for universal padlocks

We have already said that it is not a manageable switch for the user, so in principle it needs corporate access for its programming and firmware, which translates into that serial connector.

As for the sides, in one of them we have a system of two smart fans and managed by the switch itself to activate only in cases of high load. In the other, we have an opening for hot air to escape. In addition, we have the three holes to install the brackets or grips that will be used to hold the switch on racks or wall.

Ports and operation panel

We now continue with the face that we have left behind on purpose, in order to explain the port configuration of the QNAP QSW-1208-8C.

At first glance we have the following elements in the panel (from left to right):

• Status indicator (green on) Port activity indicators (one for each port) 4x independent SFP + ports Combo 4 + 4 ports RJ45 / SPF + Combo 4 + 4 ports RJ45 / SPF +

The LED panel of activity indicators in the ports will show us orange if the client is turned off or if the link is less than 10G. Rather, it will show green if the network link is 10 Gigabit / s.

Regarding ports, although it is true that we have a total of 20 of them, it is important to know how these will work. First of all, we have a panel of 4 fiber optic ports that do not combine with any other, so they can be used normally and independently of the rest (1, 2, 3 and 4).

Next, we have two grouped port panels, which are made up of 4 RJ-45 BASE-T and 4 SPF +. These form a combo or combination, which if we realize it, have the same numbering between them. This means that two ports with the same number cannot be used simultaneously. Therefore, these two panels offer a maximum of 4 useful ports each. This makes it a highly versatile switch in connectivity, since the manufacturer's NAS not only have RJ-45 ports, but also 10 Gbps fiber that sometimes due to lack of infrastructure are not used.

Of course, all available links offer a maximum bandwidth of 10 Gigabit / s, delivering a maximum bandwidth of 240 Gbps. It would be a waste to buy the switch if we do not plan to use its maximum performance. QNAP launched this team with a clear client orientation that uses NAS with Autotiering or SSD cache acceleration, thus taking advantage of the extra speed that this type of solid storage gives us.

Internal hardware

We could not stay with the desire to open this QNAP QSW-1208-8C as a good medium specialized in hardware that we are.

At first glance what we find is two clearly differentiated areas. On the one hand, we have the power supply that in this case is inside the equipment as is normal if it is intended to be mounted on racks. On the other, we have an extensive PCB where we have all the hardware installed and a huge aluminum heatsink with longitudinal fins to pass air from one end to the other thanks to the active cooling system.

This switch implements the IEEE 802.3ax standard which reduces energy consumption without detriment to high-speed connectivity. In fact, the manufacturer estimates energy savings of up to 50% compared to similar switches, consuming only 50W at maximum power. We must bear in mind, that it is not a PoE equipment, so its ports do not deliver power to the commented equipment, such as IP cameras or the like.

We see that it also offers us a PCI-type slot for extra LAN cards and the corresponding chip that is responsible for managing the firmware and indicator elements on the external panel. The main chips that we find will be two Marvell 88X3340P for synchronous 10G Ethernet that is responsible for managing each of the 8-port combos, and a third Marvell 98DX8312A0 chip that will be responsible for the 4 independent SFP + ports.

QNAP QXG-10G1T 10G Network Card

In conjunction with this switch, we have the QNAP QXG-10G1T network card that has an RJ45 BASE-T ethernet port for copper UTP connections at 10 Gigabit per second. This card is the ideal complement for NAS or client PCs that do not have integrated 10 Gbps connectivity.

The connection will be made through the PCIe 3.0 x4 interface, so in the case of desktop computers, we must ensure that we have a slot of this type or x16 available for connection. For data management, QNAP has made use of an Aquantia AQC107 chip from which we will have to download the drivers from the manufacturer's official website. In case we install it on a NAS QNAP, we will have already implemented the driver for its operation.

The purchase bundle includes a Cat.6e 4 twisted pair UTP cable, the most suitable for 10G connections. In addition, we have two plates of different sizes for expansion slots type NAS or type ATX for desktop chassis.

Test bench and performance test

Now we are going to perform a couple of tests to see the benefits of this QNAP QSW-1208-8C switch together with two 10G network cards, one of them being the QNAP QXG-10G1T.

The test equipment used will be the following:

Team 1

• Asus AREION 10GAsus ROG Maximus XI FormulaIntel Core i9-9900KSSD SATA ADATA SU750 / SSD NVMe XPG Spectrix S40G

Team 2

• QNAP QXG-10G1TASRock X570 Extreme 4AMD Ryzen 2600SSD NVMe Corsair MP510

The speed tests have been carried out with JPerf 2.0.2 and the data transfer tests with Windows Explorer. The cables used for the link are both Cat.6e UTPs.

Stream transfer

We have carried out different stream transfer tests with 10, 50 and 100 packets to evaluate the capacity of the QNAP QSW-1208-8C. for this, we have carried out 5 tests for each case and we have calculated the transfer average.

The results show constant transfers always higher than 8000 Mbps. With 10 streams, however, we even exceeded 9000 Mbps, due to the smaller number of parallel packets. Increasing above 50 streams does not adversely affect transfer capacity, since at all times we have had stable rates of 8100 - 8200 Mbps.

Data transfer

File transfer between NVMe SSDs through the switch

In this specific case we must bear in mind that the maximum capacity of one of the drives is 550 MB / s as it is SATA, so the link will be limited when the connection buffer is emptied, since Theoretically, the transfer should barely exceed 1000 MB / s.

And indeed this has been the case in the transfer from team 2 to team 1, seeing how the link becomes 1.08 GB / s (1.80 * 8 = 8.7, Gbps) when we have installed each NVMe SSD client.

File transfer between SSD SATA - NVMe through the switch

And the presence of a SATA SSD in the link causes a bottleneck. We see this clearer in the transfer from team 1 to team 2, where SATA is doing its best to reach its maximum bandwidth, which is 550 MB / s.

The bottom line is that to take full advantage of it we need NVMe SSDs.

Final words and conclusion about QNAP QSW-1208-8C

Impressive features that this QNAP QSW-1208-8C switch has given us, which despite being the first from the manufacturer, experience says present. In tests, it has demonstrated its excellent bandwidth capacity, exceeding 8 Gbps without problems and reaching 9 Gbps in streams and file transfer when using NVMe SSDs.

It is a team that for a very affordable price facing a professional gives us a maximum connectivity of 12 ports at 10G, with the capacity to address up to 240 Gbps thanks to the Marvell chips that we have seen inside. To this we add the great versatility of having RJ-45 BASE-T ports for copper cables and SPF + for fiber cables.

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Both in consumption and heating it offers us excellent performance, no more than 50W of power and a very quiet smart fan system. It supports rack cabinet installation, so it is ideal for use in small businesses alongside NAS 10G and even small-scale data centers. We would only miss that it was manageable, something necessary for certain professional environments.

The Aquatia chip 10G network card has also given us the expected performance, very small and manageable, and ideal for desktops, servers or NAS, since you have different mounting methods and PCIe 3.0 x4 slot.

We finish with the availability and price of this QNAP QSW-1208-8C and the 10G card. In the first case, we will find the switch for an approximate price of 564 euros on Amazon. While the network card will be for 125 euros in the same place. It is an affordable cost for the market niche of this type of equipment, especially for the fact of offering fiber and ethernet ports.

ADVANTAGE	DISADVANTAGES
+ NO CONFIGURATION NEEDED, PNP	- NON-MANAGABLE SWITCH, SOMETHING TO BE TAKEN INTO ACCOUNT FOR THOSE EXPERT USERS IN NETWORKS.
+ 12 PORTS AT 10G
+ SFP + AND RJ45 PORTS
+ LOW CONSUMPTION AND SILENT
+ COMPATIBLE WITH RACK

The Professional Review team awards him the platinum medal

QNAP QSW-1208-8C

DESIGN - 85%

PERFORMANCE - 99%

PORTS - 97%

FIRMWARE AND EXTRAS - 86%

PRICE - 88%

91%