{"id":4094,"date":"2021-11-19T20:33:02","date_gmt":"2021-11-19T19:33:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/?p=4094"},"modified":"2021-11-29T20:34:00","modified_gmt":"2021-11-29T19:34:00","slug":"ukin-tech-update-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-the-switch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/2021\/11\/products\/ukin-tech-update-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-the-switch\/","title":{"rendered":"UKIN Tech Update: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Switch"},"content":{"rendered":"

One question that Sophos has been asked recently is, \u201cWhen are you going to produce a switch?\u201d\u00a0Happily,\u00a0the answer to that is now!\u00a0 Ten new switches will be introduced\u00a0to the market\u00a0in the first half of 2022,\u00a0with the release for the first switches as early as\u00a0mid-December 2021.\u00a0The Sophos Switch Series<\/a> will eventually consist of ten models with options for 8, 24 and 48 ports, both 1GE and 2.5GE, and include models with Full Power over Ethernet.\u00a0They are designed for use at the\u00a0network access layer\u00a0for customers in small to medium-sized businesses.\u00a0With little experience in the switch world\u00a0to date, I was an ideal candidate\u00a0to set up a switch to assess the level of complexity.<\/p>\n

Unboxing the switch and connecting it is\u00a0straightforward enough.\u00a0Logging into\u00a0your Sophos\u00a0Central\u00a0portal,\u00a0the first stage of setting up the switches is to define the site\u00a0(or\u00a0sites)\u00a0being\u00a0managed.\u00a0Sophos Central organises switches into sites\u00a0which can be created\u00a0either by using the \u201cGetting Started Wizard\u201d or by clicking the \u201cAdd site\u201d button\u00a0and giving the site a name and optional map location.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Once the site is\u00a0defined, you can create\u00a0default\u00a0site-level port and\u00a0VLANs\u00a0which then apply to any switch added to the site.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Adding a new switch\u00a0is,\u00a0again,\u00a0simple enough. This can be done by selecting the switches menu on the left and clicking the \u201cAdd Switch\u201d button. Then you just need to enter the serial number of the device and click \u201cRegister\u201d, Sophos Central then waits for the switch to be powered on. This is\u00a0pretty much identical\u00a0to the Wireless setup and so should be familiar to anyone with experience with our APX access points. The switch only needs\u00a0an internet connection, and it will register with Sophos Central and\u00a0immediately\u00a0download the latest firmware and any\u00a0VLAN\u00a0configurations for the current site.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Sophos Central also allows\u00a0VLAN\u00a0and port configuration per\u00a0switch, as well as providing\u00a0a graphical display of the\u00a0current switch configuration and POE settings.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Most configuration can be done from\u00a0Sophos\u00a0Central, but each switch can be accessed by its own CLI (Command Line Interface) or web interface for more\u00a0in-depth\u00a0custom configuration.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

There are many settings and diagnostic\/logs on the switch itself, including a\u00a0built-in\u00a0cable tester.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ARP table\u00a0listings\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

And detailed port information from the switch as per the below:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Overall,\u00a0these\u00a0switches are a tremendous addition to the Sophos family of security\u00a0solutions. I certainly hope I can keep mine for the foreseeable future!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unboxing a Sophos Switch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":1190,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[16],"coauthors":[198],"class_list":["post-4094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-products","tag-technical-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2020\/04\/featured-image-UKI-tech-update-Partner-app-icon-1600x960-1.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4094"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4137,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4094\/revisions\/4137"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1190"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4094"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/partnernews.sophos.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=4094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}