What are people using for console servers these days? We've
historically used retired routers with ASYNC ports, but it's time for
an upgrade.
OpenGear seems to have some nice stuff, anyone else?
We're using opengear CM4116 to have a remote console access to all our
routers, switches and wdm transponders. They work well and do the job.
Avocent is also another player you might consider with their ACS series.
I don't know much about the others.
At least someone is.. We couldn't keep their -48vdc products from
dying every few months requiring a manual reboot, or hardware
replacement.
Outside of that, they did a few things nobody else seemed to do, but
they had a few drawbacks such as pppd not supporting classless on
inbound dial-in connections (hopefully that's fixed now).
We really like Lantronix .. use them a lot.
Paul
+1 Opengear
Jensen Tyler
Sr Engineering Manager
Fiberutilities Group, LLC
(319) 297-6915 (office) *NEW
(319) 364-8100 (fax)
(319) 329-8578 (mobile)
Avocent Cyclades ACS. Enterprise class.
http://www.avocent.com/Products/Category/Serial_Appliances.aspx
-Hammer-
"I was a normal American nerd"
-Jack Herer
+1 for the Lantronix SLC.
Lantronix still makes terminal servers? Huh. I designed their first ones over 20 years ago!
Mike
Dan White wrote:
+1 for OpenGear. They come in a range of port densities, AC or DC power,
various OOB options and were significantly cheaper than the Avocet
alternatives. I have used the IM4200 in larger sites and also ACM5000 and
CM4000 in small POPs without issue.
Ian
+1 for OpenGear. I asked this same question about a year ago..
Hi,
Thanks, all.
Love the boxes. Absolutely despise the ~50 mhz processor they put in them
that takes 10 seconds to negotiate SSH.
Opengear
I use Opengear more often now on smaller installs.. Works well and they
have some neat add ons (Nagios, UPS monitoring etc)
Asaf Rapoport
Another +1 to Opengear
Just buy the units that have the pinout for your devices, or you may need
adapters.
+1 for Cyclades .. we've been using a few of these with a bunch 20-port
PDU strips (2 x 15A circuits) and they've worked out pretty well for us.
We did have some overheating issues with the PDU's though, but this was
fixed with an adjustment to the HVAC (CYCLADES-ACS-PM-MIB is your friend 
We're using some of those, no trouble with them to date.
And making them gets boring very quickly!