Networking question

Lisa White

Hey guys, I need a little advice on what type of home networking hub I should buy. I had my electrician install cat5 to all of my tv sets and I want to setup a network to tvheadend server. My router does not have enough ports and I am going to need a hub. My internet speed is 1gig. Can anyone tell me what brand I should buy and should I get a managed or unmanaged plug and play?

thanks
Lisa

Hiro Protagonist

Speaking as a networking professional:
You'll be wanting a switch, not a hub [but hubs are pretty rare these days anyway].
In a similar situation a while back I purchased a gigabit fanless switch - unmanaged should be fine.

The brand doesn't matter too much in my opinion.

Don't be taken in by fancy features, what I wanted [and I suspect you do too] is to have something you can plug in, and it 'just works'.
Any layer 2 switch should be able to do this.

Lisa White

Thanks for your input. What brand does your expertise recommend? Is Netgear a good one?

Thanks

Hiro Protagonist

No experience with Netgear personally.

I ended up buying a TP-Link, but really that was because it met my requirements & I could get one at a good price rather then any brand preference.

As long as you buy a recognised brand, you should be OK - this sort of thing isn't a demanding application.