[Beowulf] recommendations for a good ethernet switch for connecting ~300 compute nodes

[Rahul Nabar]

On Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 6:27 AM, Hearns, John<john.hearns at mclaren.com> wrote:

> In that case, consider that most motherboards have dual gig Ethernet
> onboard.

Yes. I've made sure mine do. Twin gigabit sockets.

> You could at least specify that the cabling plant is put in for the
> second Ethernet network

I've always used both but in the past via bonding.

> and aim to use that for the storage traffic (or the MPI traffic). A

Would it be better to use one exclusively for MPI? I'm not sure how
one goes about this yet!
The separation is maintained at switches too? An MPI switch separate
from the rest-of-traffic switch?

> second stack of
> Ethernet switches should not stretch your budget too much.

True. I am very tempted to go that route.

> Then on the main storage node you could put in a 10gig interface - or
> indeed several 10gig
> interfaces and spread the load

Yes. That is exactly the sort of thing I am wanting to do. That's why
I am asking around. e.g. how many could I put in a reasonable config.?
It is easier to go fancy on the main node since the cost does not get
a multiplier.

-- 
Rahul