EXTRALINK - the ideal PoE switch for IP monitoring

What's PoE ?
PoE standards
Which PoE switch for IP cameras ?
Switch PoE manageable
Switch PoE unmanageable

Ideal PoE switch for IP cameras

Ideal PoE switch for IP cameras

What's PoE ?

Power over Ethernet (802.3 af/at) is a system for powering devices using the most commonly used network cable - twisted pair cat.5e or higher. PoE power supply can be used for 10, 100 and 1000Mbps. Providing power to the devices has no effect on data transmission.

With this solution, we can transfer both data and electrical current with one network cable. In short, PoE simplifies the whole installation and eliminates the need to connect devices to the 230V network.

This change obviously increases the power consumption of the power supply device.

It should also be noted that the PoE standard was defined in 2003, providing 15.4W of power for each connection. In fact, it looks like the device gets 12.95W. The rest is for the losses associated with power transmission.

PoE standards

Currently, there are three standards for transferring power over the mains cable:

PoE (802.3af)
PoE+ (802.3at)
UPoE

With an explanation that the oldest PoE can deliver up to 15.4W, PoE+ up to 30W and UPoE (Universal PoE) up to 60W.

The following figure shows the development of PoE:

PoE+ has been introduced due to higher power requirements for powered devices. The same reason led to the introduction of UPoE. The standard introduced by Cisco allows powering equipment with power up to 60W.

UPoE uses 4 pairs of cables to transfer power and thanks to this solution it is possible to power e.g. virtual desktop displays, various access controllers and LED lights.

PoE+

UPoE

PoE standards are best illustrated by the following table:

	PoE	PoE+	UPOE
Cable type	Cat5e	Cat5e	Cat5e
IEEE standard	802.3af	802.3at	CISCO property
Maximum power per PSE* port	15.4 W	30 W	60 W
Maximum power per PD*	12.95 W	25.5 W	51 W
Pairs used	2	2	4

*Where:

PSE - Power Sourcing Equipment

PD - Powered Device - device powered via PoE

Which PoE switch for IP cameras ?

Okay, with that knowledge, we can get to the point...

A PoE concentrator is one of the most important elements of an IP monitoring system, as it connects all network devices (e.g. IP cameras, NVRs or VoIP phones). It also provides PoE for all network devices supporting this standard.

It should also guarantee consistent operation of the whole system with high intensity of data streams.

Extralink has launched a new product - 8 port managed Gigabit PoE switch with 2 Up Link ports (2xSFP 1000M) with a very graceful name VICTOR.

Extralink VICTOR has the following characteristics:

2x SFP 1000M Victor is an ideal solution for a network structure based on IP monitoring.

As can be seen in the attached diagram, EXTRALINK VICTOR easily supports a large number of cameras, VoIP phones and wireless devices (Mimosa B5) in 802.3at (48V) standard.

Moreover, thanks to the use of e.g. Ubiquiti INSTANT 802.3af we can also easily power devices that need 24V.

150W maximum load and versatility allows the implementation of such a switch practically anywhere in the office or even industrial network.