I have at least 8 peripherals in my office computer system that use Ethernet networking. The only way to connect them all to my network is to use a network switch. A network switch is just a pass-through for all your connections. You connect the network to the switch, and then plug in all your device network cables.
Currently, I am using a Netgear 8 port switch. I think it is at least 7 years old. I have been having network problems the past few weeks. It appears the Netgear is going bad. Or, it could be just old technology for all the new devices I have. 1 Either way, I bought a new tp-Link network switch. A network switch is not expensive. The more ports mean more expense, but still fairly inexpensive overall. Here is what the tp-Link switch looks like.
I connected the tp-Link to my network. After some adjusting, everything seems to work fine. I don’t notice any faster network speeds, but at least all my devices are working and not reporting errors.
At some point, you just have to update your network equipment to keep up with the networking capabilities of new devices.
Doug
- I checked the Netgear website and noted this switch is considered obsolete. ↩
