Devices that get cables in the front and others the back??

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Digital-Vortex

Gawd
Joined
Dec 11, 2001
Messages
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Just a observation while going through the network gallery.

How come most devices all get the cables in the back. Yet switches are always the front?
Why dont they make switches just lights at the front and loads of in at the back? that would certainly help the cable management issues!

Apart from the obvious switch may get moved about scenario I cant see the point.

Anyone?
 
my guess is the routers dont need cables in the front because the cables are gonna stay plugged into that port. switches since you may add or subtract subnets/users they need to be in the front for easy access. only a guess though on my part im sure someone will correct me if im wrong.
 
Digital-Vortex said:
Just a observation while going through the network gallery.

How come most devices all get the cables in the back. Yet switches are always the front?
Why dont they make switches just lights at the front and loads of in at the back? that would certainly help the cable management issues!

Apart from the obvious switch may get moved about scenario I cant see the point.

Anyone?
Click to expand...

Because that would be less user-friendly. I'd hate to be reaching deep into the back of the rack to plug in computers, which can happen fairly frequently. Also, it lets you quickly see which line is plugged into which port, which matters when you're doing port-specific monitoring/limiting.

The solution to the issue is patch panels, and it's the best solution.
 
I can understand routers. As you said they aint moving.

But you still have cables running from the front of the switch all the way round to servers.
and Racks tend to have a door at the front and back so that would rule out having to reach round all the time (depending on where your cabinet is)
 
Patch panels have the masses of cables bundled together in the back of them, it's more space efficient to have the RJ-45 jacks facing the front, with the bundles of cables in the rear. I mean, just picture the nightmare of having the patch panel ports also mixed in the rear where all the bundles of cables are. Ever wire up a large patch panel with many ports? If so, this should be easy to picture why it is what it is.

Switches face the front so you just need short cables from patch panel to switch.

Sometimes you're relocating who gets plugged into what...so it's easier to eyeball it all when it's all in front of you, easily accessed.

Servers are a tiny percentage of all the ports being used.
 
not to mention if you're removing patch cables from unused ports, you would have to notate all the lights that are un-lit, then run around to the back, find notated port numbers, and remove.
gets even worse when you have 20ft+ long worth of racks.

with the ports on the front, it's so easy!
 
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