Experts show their expertise through action not through self-proclamation.

An ex-colleague asked me how much is a Cisco switch 24-port gigabit port worth. I asked him why did he want to know, was he intending to buy a Cisco switch?

He told me that he got a dispute call from a customer said that his Cisco switch is not “working” with Huawei HG256 device.

The Huawei product can be found here.

Now this customer seemed to take the word from the Starhub Sales that Huawei device works with Cisco switch. Hence this customer bought the Cisco switch, (Wow… he’s really rich, a used Cisco 24-port gigabit switch is still expensive) and connected the switch to the FE ports of HG256 and not working! Next is he called up Starhub customer service to complain and said he was an “expert”..

Is he really an expert? If he is why did he take the word of the sales? Did he do research about how a Cisco switch can operate with HG256?

From what I see from the specs of HG256, there’s no indication that it supports 802.1q tags. Cisco 3560 switch and 3750 switch have default switch port configuration as dynamic auto and ISL trunking (copper ports). Did he actually connect the an UTP from the switch to the FE port of HG256 and expect it to work?!

The point here is Starhub website did not explicitly state that HG256 supports Cisco switch! If it did not explicitly say so, then he should be the person to find out how Cisco switch can interoperate with the HG256 and not called up Starhub customer service and dispute!

Now, if he changes the switch port to access mode it should work! Switchport by default is the member of vlan1, the native vlan that’s not tagged, this vlan 1 can be used to support non-802.1q compliant hardware, this should make it operable.

An expert shows his/her expertise through action and not self-proclaiming himself/herself as an expert….