I Need Help!! Gigabit vs. 100Meg Cisco Units and Switches

[jamesperez]

So we have about 1300 units in service, it's a converged network, most of the devices are 7942G and 7962G, the Ethernet switched are a 100meg.

What's the best approach to upgrade to Gig?,

Also, what are the thoughts about having the Cisco units part of the Gig LAN?, if that's the case, we would have to trade up to the 8 series and it seems like a waste of money.

I almost want to say that if a data jack is available in the cubicle, we stick with the 100 meg for the phone and just add gig switches.

Also I have a bunch of 7 series 100 meg units to deploy, I'm thinking we just install 100 meg PoE switched for them and have the data network separated

Any input?

[Chris Deren]

79X2's are 100mb phones, so having 1 GB is not going to change anything on the phones, if you have PCs connected via the phone they will not be limited to 100mb as well.  Phones themselves never push anywhere need these speeds, so what's important is the speed for the attached PCs. If you need to keep these connected via phones then you'd need to replace your phones with newer 88XX for example, or 79X5 models.

[jamesperez]

Thank you, I'm just wondering what the direction of the VoIP community is when posed with this issue. 7 Series 100meg phone, providing connection to a PC.  I.T. then wants to migrate to 1 Gig. Is it cheaper to put up a gig switch and have separate LAN connections to the PC and Phone, or upgrade the phone.  Also, the 8 series requires (enhanced licensing), What's the most cost effective approach?

[Chris Deren]

I have not done the cost analysis, but that should be simple enough, the issue with additional switch ports if you do not have the capacity now is not just the cost of that switches, but ensuring you have sufficient fiber uplinks, annual Cisco maintanance, additional power and cooling cost, etc.  

[jamesperez]

Understood, I'm just struggling that now the telephone is part of the data throughput equation.

It almost seems to make more sense to just have voice as a application on the PC. (Softphone, Jabber etc,) Seems like desk phones are obsolete.