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EnGenius ECS2512FP Review Rating
Generalize
EnGenius ECS2512FP is an excellent switch, very suitable for SMB environments that require future-oriented network solutions.
advantage
- Full range of switches will prove your network in the future
- The free Engenius Cloud features should be enough to meet the needs of most small businesses
- Local and ezMaster management options
shortcoming
- Engenius Cloud limits certain features to paid subscriptions
We are still a few years away from 10GbE becoming mainstream. Although network cards are reasonably priced, switches are still very expensive.
On the other hand, 2.5GbE seems to have become very popular in the past year or two. I reviewed several affordable 2.5GbE switches, and now many motherboards are equipped with network adapters that can handle this speed. It may be that the theoretical connection speed of WiFi 6 is 2400Mbps, driving the adoption of 2.5GbE, and many advanced access points and router ports operate at this speed.
Even if there are several access points linked EnGenius ECW230 and Zyxel NWA210AX There is a 2.5GbE uplink port, and there are not many options that can drive it.
EnGenius ECS2512FP is one of the few multi-gigabit switches equipped with POE on the market, designed to complement the range of Engenius access points equipped with 2.5GbE.
Like many new EnGenius products, it has multiple management options. You can stick to the old Web GUI, use the self-hosted ezMaster or choose the new EnGenius Cloud management system.
Prices and features of EnGenius Cloud Basic and Pro
With EnGenius Cloud, you don’t need any cloud keys or additional software, everything is done through EnGenius Cloud Domain. Most of the core features can be used for free, but you can also pay for a Pro license to extend the features.
The pricing is reasonable, but it depends on the number of devices you have. The charge for each device is 50 USD/1 year + tax or 120 USD/3 years + tax.
The benefits of a professional plan include:
- 30 days vs 3 days statistics
- Unlimited team members vs 10
- Ability to clone the network
- 10,000 entries and 100 entries for Cloud Radius and credential services
- Better alert notification
- Ability to backup and restore network-wide settings
- Customer list export (.csv)
- API integration (3rd party)
- Scheduling report system (1 report is available for free)
- Use online tools to get priority support
- Customer timetable
- WiFi floor (obstacles and virtual AP)-free plan includes WiFi floor plan heat map
- Dynamic VLAN
- myPSK (dynamic/private PSK)
- VLAN pooling
- Broadcast suppression
- AD/LDAP/Google authentication
- Complete real-time diagnostic tool
- Real-time customer list
- RF spectrum analysis
- Air Guard
- Switch template (port configuration)
- Extend to network topology beyond EnGenius devices
Therefore, there are many features included in the professional plan, but I think most small businesses will live without them.
Inside the box/product photo
There is not much excitement in the box, it is standard enterprise switch content. In addition to the switch itself, you also have a pair of rack ears, some 3M foam stickers to reduce vibration, a serial port cable and power cord.
The switches are arranged logically; each port has its own LED, one is used to identify whether it is connected and the connection mode (POE or not), and the other is used to indicate the connection speed.
Then on the left, you have various status LEDs. It is difficult for you to reach a healthy 240W POE budget, so the Max LED is unlikely to trigger. Due to my constant repairs, faulty LEDs are always useful to me.
set up
I already have an EnGenius Cloud account, so I set up everything using the mobile app and web interface. Similar to most IoT devices today, you can use the app to scan a QR code, which will register the device. You must assign it to your network, and it will also update the firmware. The update process means that it takes a long time for the switch to register correctly in the cloud interface.
EnGenius cloud settings
When I reviewed some EnGenius products, some of them were displayed in my dashboard, allowing me to manage multiple devices from one interface, which is a big selling point of cloud networking.
In the switch settings, you can get an overview of the status. You can see which ports are used and how it is connected via different color speeds and uplink and POE indicators. This proved useful to me because I only connected to registered gigabit access points, which seemed to be the result of poor quality cables.
You have a large number of settings, including switch level and port level.
You have the usual VLAN options, but you can also set up an automatic voice VLAN, which you can use in automatic mode or through an organization unique identifier.
In each port setting, you can give priority to POE. If the POE budget is exceeded, low-priority devices will be shut down. Vlan/Voice VLAN options, QoS and various other basic options.
Other switch-wide settings include mirrored ports, POE plans, link aggregation, and switch logs.
I have enabled Pro features, which can be used for free for one year. The free option does not really lack any switch functions, but the Pro function has very useful topology functions. Extend the network diagram beyond Engenius products to include your other equipment. This provides some useful insights into what is associated with what when I use a provider of disorganized network design.
Local network graphical user interface
I don’t really use the local GUI myself, but you can use it alone or combine it with cloud services. In contrast, if the Zyxel switch is enabled in Nebula, the local GUI will direct you to the Nebula portal.
Performance-throughput and fan noise
I have 10GbE and 2.5GbE on my desktop. In the past, I used Mellanox Connectx for SFP connections, but I couldn’t get the old card to run on Windows for this review, so I used the FS 10GBASE-T SFP+ transceiver to convert the SFP port to 10Gb RJ-45.
As you might expect, when connected to a wired device, both 2.5Gbps and 10Gbps ports work exactly as expected. This makes a big difference to anyone handling large file transfers over the network. With the growth of creators, the demand for this kind of performance is increasing, which is useful in both SOHO and SMB environments.
The most important thing here is 2.5Gb POE. This can drive an increase in the number of access points that can achieve gigabit WIFI speeds. As WiFi 6E devices begin to come out, the demand for 2.5Gb POE will undoubtedly increase significantly, because these devices can easily surpass Gigabit speeds without all the difficulties of DFS channels.
To my chagrin, when testing the access point, it is difficult for me to connect at 2.4Gbps, which indicates that there is a problem with the 160Mhz channel width, which is a big problem with 5Ghz WiFi.
When I was finally able to connect to WiFi 6 at 160Mhz, I was able to achieve an iPerf speed of 1.51Gbits/sec. In contrast, when using a gigabit connection, this speed drops to 921Mbps, so throughput is increased by 64%.
Switching to WiFi 5 at 160Mhz, I was able to connect at a speed of 1.7Gbps. Through this, I achieved a speed of 1.17Gbits/sec
This is not a fanless switch, which is expected due to the 240W POE budget. The fans are running 100% of the time, and they are too loud for me to use in the office. However, the fan noise is lower than the Zyxel NWA1123-AC-HD I also own, which is a switch that powers my access point.
Prices and alternatives
In the UK, the price of EnGenius ECS2512FP ranges from £635 to £872.68.
I covered the alternative options in more detail in my 2.5-Gigabit POE switch post.
For many buyers, it is more logical to stick to a brand. Take EnGenius as an example. You can manage everything through EnGenius Cloud. If you have a large number of devices, you can simplify network management.
However, competing options include:
The TP-Link TL-SG3210XHP-M2 starts at £330-a lot cheaper, but you lose two 10Gb SFP+ ports. I haven’t used TP-Link’s cloud management Omada, so I can’t compare the quality.
Zyxel XS1930-12HP is about £950-more expensive, but has 10 10 Gbps ports, plus 2 10 Gbps SFP+ and a larger 375W POE budget. I use Zyxel Nebula as my access point, and I still run Zyxel NWA1123-AC-HD, with a similar level of functionality in the free version.
comprehensive
EnGenius ECS2512FP is an excellent switch, very suitable for SMB environments that require future-oriented network solutions.
Engenius Cloud is a user-friendly cloud management system that should allow non-network experts to easily manage the network. The free-to-use cloud service has all the functions I need as a small business owner, and the paid function does not add a lot of cost to a large enterprise.
The options of local, self-hosted, and fully cloud management capabilities will attract many users and reassure them that in the worst case, they can fall back to local access.
The overall performance of the switch is excellent, and 2.5Gb POE allows me to achieve speeds of more than 1500Mbps through WiFi 6.
Although this switch is not cheap, it is not completely unreasonable, and it is certainly affordable for many companies.
