10Gb/s Ethernet: what I did to get it working in my home

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Why 10 GbE at Home?

  • Strong split between “fun / overkill” and “genuinely useful.”
  • Skeptics: 1 Gbps (often less) is enough for web, streaming, and typical home use; many WAN links or services can’t fill multi‑gig pipes.
  • Enthusiasts: multi‑gig WAN and 10 GbE LAN routinely help with:
    • Large game downloads and media libraries.
    • NAS access that feels like local SSD/SATA.
    • Heavy backups, cloud restores, remote sync, and data‑heavy startup workloads.
  • Some argue that “more bandwidth” helps mainly with occasional large transfers; others insist that as capacity appears, use cases follow.

10GBASE‑T vs SFP+, Fiber, and DAC

  • 10GBASE‑T (RJ45 over copper) widely criticized for:
    • Higher latency, error rates, power draw, and very hot SFP+‑to‑RJ45 modules.
  • Newer 10GBASE‑T SFP+ modules reportedly halve power and run cooler at full (≈100 m) distance, but old ones remain common.
  • Many prefer optical SFP+ or DAC:
    • Cheaper optics, lower power, cooler, and more reliable.
    • 40G/100G optical gear can be surprisingly cheap used; no equivalent for RJ45 at those speeds.
  • Some still favor 10GBASE‑T for PoE to APs and for existing in‑wall copper.

Cabling Choices (Cat5e/6/6a vs Fiber)

  • Multiple reports of 10 GbE working stably over decent Cat5e, even 15–20 years old, especially over typical home distances.
  • Others only achieve 2.5/5 GbE on Cat5e and choose multi‑gig switches instead of full 10G.
  • Cat6a is often run “just in case”; cost premium is small compared to re‑cabling.
  • Strong advocacy for single‑mode fiber in new installs:
    • “Pull fiber once, upgrade gear later.”
    • Ultra‑thin or “invisible” fiber cited as retrofit‑friendly.
  • Warning about “CCA” (copper‑clad aluminum) cable marketed as Ethernet: considered non‑standard and potentially unsafe for PoE/electrical.

Thermals, Power, and Noise

  • Heat is a major practical hurdle:
    • Older copper 10G SFP+ modules and some small switches run extremely hot, causing link flaps.
    • Mitigations: fans, extra heatsinks, picking low‑power “new‑gen” modules.
  • Concerns about always‑on power costs; rough back‑of‑envelope shows it’s noticeable but not huge over many years.

Routers, Switches, and Performance

  • Software routers (e.g., small x86 boxes) can hit nice speed‑test numbers but may struggle with:
    • New‑connection latency, CPS rate, QoS, and jitter compared to hardware‑offloaded appliances.
  • Hardware firewalls/routers (FortiGate, MikroTik, UniFi, etc.) praised for:
    • Near‑line‑rate 10G NAT/firewall, good QoS, and lower power, though full NGFW features can reduce throughput.
  • Many suggest using:
    • One small 10G switch for high‑speed endpoints and a larger 1G/2.5G switch for everything else.

Backups, Time Machine, and Reliability

  • 10 GbE particularly valued for:
    • Initial Time Machine backups, large macOS backups to NAS, and multi‑TB syncs.
  • Experiences with Time Machine vary:
    • Some report years of stability to SMB shares on certain NASes.
    • Others recall frequent corruption and restarts on other vendors.
  • Noted that macOS heavily throttles backup I/O by default; a sysctl can speed this up at the cost of more impact on foreground work.