Linksys 5 Port Workgroup Hub Review

Overall Rating

Small.

Power supply half the size of the hub. Doesn't act like a hub, acts like a switch!

I am using a 10/100 hub 5 port Linksys hub - Model EFAH05W.V2.

Desire: Carry a small ethernet hub in my laptop bag to use when troubleshooting network issues using a Protocol Analyzer. With a hub, one can plug in the node, the analyzer, and the uplink without mirroring or spanning a port on a switch.

Symptoms: The protocol analyzer only sees broadcast traffic - no unicast traffic between the node and a device over the uplink.

Solution: I called Linksys tech support, for the second time, after replacing my original unit. The tech who answered the phone went off to confer and came back saying that the hub is in fact acting like a switch due to the chip which is used internally. I asked him if this was documented anywhere and he said no. Solution: get a different product.

Members' Comments onPseudocyber.'s Review

• Zarko. on 6th Nov 2002

  It would be interesting to learn if the reviewer, has actually found a small laptop-able hub. For general use one could say that getting essentially a switch under the cover of a hub would be a bonus, but since for some purposes it apparently isnt, it would be nice to hear about the actual solution.

• Kevin Winters. on 11th Dec 2002

  Common problem, It is getting harder and harder to find a true hub. I carry around a 10 meg blackbox hub that works well. Haven't found a small 100 or 10/100 that wasn't actually a switch.

• gscottj on 29th Jun 2004

  Actually, I looked at the Linksys webpage. Apparently, the shared uplink port is switched. I guess that the rest isn't. Would whatever you had plugged into the uplink port, work in the fifth, non-uplink port that the uplink port shares with?

• majacoby on 6th Dec 2004

  I had installed this model Linksys Hub in an IDS monitoring set-up. The company that does our IDS monitoring came back to me and said that all they could see is broadcast traffic. I read this page and changed to ports 2, 3 & 4 because of the reply gscottj made on 29 June 2004. I still have the same results, only broadcast traffic. Not a passive Hub!

• conroyd on 15th Apr 2005

  I bought one of these this morning, for exactly the same reason. The switch I want to monitor doesn't have span or mirror capabilities.
  
  I suspected it was acting as a switch, but it's good to see it confirmed.
  
  FWIW, 3Com® OfficeConnect® Dual Speed Hub 5 is apparently a guaranteed hub, Product #: 3C16755.
  
  I've just ordered one.