Tenda TEG3328F — L2 Managed Switch

Buying it, and when not to

The TEG3328F is an L2 managed switch with no PoE. Layer 2 management means proper VLANs, trunking, link aggregation, spanning tree and port controls - the things a network needs once it stops being a flat set of cables.

This is a core or aggregation switch. Put it at the centre of a building and hang PoE access switches off it; carry VLANs for staff, guests, cameras and management as trunks between them; aggregate links so a single cable failure does not isolate a floor. For a hotel, a campus, a serviced office or an ISP's point of presence, this is where the network's structure actually lives, and trying to achieve it with unmanaged switches produces a network nobody can fault-find.

It is the wrong purchase for a small flat network with a dozen devices - an unmanaged TEG1016G does that for a fraction of the price and there is nothing to misconfigure. It also supplies no PoE: access points and cameras need a PoE switch below it, such as the TEG1120P-16-250W or the cloud-managed TEG2220P-16-250W. And if the design requires routing between those VLANs, static routes or a routed campus core, Layer 2 is not enough - the TEG5328F is the L3 version and that is the box for the job.