* Netgear switches use PowerDsine chips for Power over Ethernet
PowerDsine and Netgear recently teamed up, putting PowerDsine’s Power over Ethernet technology into Netgear’s switches.
PowerDsine has 802.3af-compatible chips, and now those chips will be used in Netgear’s ProSafe eight-port 10/100M bit/sec desktop switch with four ports of PoE.
PowerDsine and Netgear are billing the new switch as a way to hook up wireless LAN access points and network-based video surveillance systems. These are devices that may be installed in difficult-to-reach areas – and so you wouldn’t want to have to worry about getting both a data line and electrical power to the devices.
By using PoE, both the Ethernet signal and the power can be delivered over the same line. Proponents say such an arrangement results in easier maintenance, less downtime and installation flexibility. In the year and a half since the standardization of PoE in the IEEE, its momentum has continued to grow.
The companies make another interesting point. An uninterruptible power supply installed along with the network switch would act as a power backup for all of the WLAN access points and surveillance cameras connected to that switch.
Netgear says one of the big selling points of PowerDsine’s technology is that so much is integrated into its switches. That makes it easier for a system vendor like Netgear to slide the functionality into its equipment.
Netgear’s switch, the FS108P, is shipping now. The company has used PowerDsine’s chips before, in its ProSafe 24-port 10/100 Layer 3 managed switch with two Gigabit Ethernet ports and PoE. That product has been shipping for about a year.
