Hello there, I've just purchased a synology DS214+, which supports link aggregation via the two gigabit ports it has on the back. I've had a brief look into it, and it sounds rather interesting. I'm a little confused on a few things though, so I was hoping one of you fine chaps might be able to help me out. Firstly, I believe the aggregation is set up on a managed switch. If I connect a managed and unmanaged switch together, can I aggregate the links? Secondly, for my pc, do the two ports for the aggregation need to come off the same NIC? Or could I use the built in NIC and a single port PCI-E card? Thanks!
to have link aggregation on the pc, you will need an operating system/network drivers that support it. unmanaged switches wont support link aggregation, and so may cause looping issues you may find this site interesting.
You can connect a managed switch to a non-managed switch, but the devices on the non-managed switch will still be limited to the speed of a single port. You will also require a NIC that supports aggregation on both ports, I'd be surprised if an on-board NIC will support it. Usually it's only supported on higher end 'enterprise' hardware as most home users wouldn't require it. I happen to have a managed switch for sale if you are interested, might have a Dual NIC card also... http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=260419
Thanks for the input - @atomic, I've already ordered a managed switch, but If you happen to have a NIC I would be interested. I think it might be easiest to run an aggregated link to the Nas, but standard 1gbps to the PC's on the network. Should still speed things up if one or more pc access the nas right?
upload and download speeds will still be limited to the single port speeds, all the aggregation does is provide redundancy/capacity, so if more than one task accesses the network it can go a different route without interrupting(therefore slowing down) a different task.
