Anyone have any info or experience with the Nexus line of Cisco switches? I see N3K and N5K switches on ebay for reasonable prices with 10GB ports, these would be a cheap way to put in 24+ 10GB connections for those that want the speed in their home lab.
What I don’t know is if these switches continue to work if you don’t have a support contract. I know you wont be able to get OS updates on these, but if they still function they might be really useful.
These appear to be SDN (software defined networking) devices running on Xeon processors.
The other thought is, if the NX-OS stops working, I wonder if these could have pfSense loaded for a mega firewall.
After that, since people will probably ask, Cisco 2960S with a D in the part number has SFP+ for 10GB SFP+ modules if you only need a couple of ports. They are also stacking switches though the stack doesn’t seem particularly fast. It is also the minimal switch for the current (February 2020 onward) CCNA/CCNP testing. P in the part number is POE, D is SFP+, not sure about the other letters but you can pick up the 24 port SFP+ for around $200 to $300 depending on condition.