The day-long Managed Switching Technical Workshops included an introduction to more sophisticated layer 2 and layer 3 switch models. Stacking, port trunking and Voice VLAN configuration all came under the spotlight from NETGEAR System Engineer, Neil Smart.
Such was the demand, Nimans ran courses over two consecutive days at its Manchester headquarters. Two resellers made a 600-mile round trip and overnight stay from Brighton. Others travelled from Northamptonshire and Yorkshire.
Nimans’ Data Installation Specialist, Geoff Wilde, emphasised: “There’s constant demand for resellers to improve their working knowledge about switches which are the hub or centre of the network. These courses concentrated on higher end switches; looking at different set-ups and how to control voice and data traffic compared to unmanaged plug-and-play switches.”
The majority of resellers were from a telecoms background and highlighted the issues of getting to grips with data. “On many occasions you attend a customer site and data is already there,” one commented. “My job is to add voice but consistency and quality can be a problem, especially drop-outs. It’s difficult to diagnose on a network you don’t control. The ability to understand data as well as voice is a big advantage. Courses of this nature are a big step forward in bridging the knowledge gap for us.”