Not that device in particular but the number of locations and RS-232
ports per device may drive you in a certain direction.
I've been looking for a new solution as well. With 100's of locations I
find you need some sort of dashboard to track and manage devices,
whether home-grown or from a provider.
We originally used Opengear 3G console servers but had to replace them
as Verizon phased out 3G service so we put together our own RPi with a
Verizon 4G USB cellular modem and a Startech USB/RS-232 adapter with
appropriate number of ports. That <$200 solution worked pretty well but
if you don't pay attention to tunnel management (make sure it switches
back to on-net link) it's easy to rack up a 5 figure Verizon bill even
with a M2M type service.
So if you have a lot of devices to manage having visibility into them
and/or cellular is key. Tunnels become less important if you are
willing to pay for static IPv4 or stable IPv6 addresses from the carrier
but you still have to monitor them.
I looked at some ~$1500+ devices but at scale it becomes a pretty
significant capital project and I consider tunnel/cellular management
more important anyhow.
I tested the Digi Connect IT-4 with Hologram and it worked well but they
didn't have Verizon as a carrier at the time (they do now for additional
fee). We provide cellular backhaul to many T-Mobile and AT&T sites so
in the event our PoP/cabinet becomes isolated the concern is that same
towers we provide backhaul to would be how we would gain out-of-band
access to our equipment said outage. Point being in our case having
primary access to Verizon is important.
I'm currently looking to test Symetry (Verizon, T-Mobile, AT&T)+ Peplink
router. Peplink has a what looks like a very nice tunnel service
dashboard (InTouch @ ~$40/year/device) but their hardware is lacking
console ports so you still need some type console/RS-232 server if you
need more than 1 port. I'm considering leaving the RPi and Startech in
place as a terminal server (works well) but using the Peplink+Intouch
for cellular access/tunnel management (where we struggled).
There's also consideration of what you are planning to do with RS-232
access. Are you just doing occasional "show interface" commands when
you lose in-band access, uploading firmware/bootloaders, or collecting
telemetry.
Anyhow, based on what I looked at so far, I think most of the integrated
rack mount console servers are pretty similar in features, cost and
reliability but your cellular related requirements may matter (eSIM or
multiple carrier support for example). Some also seemed to differ in
tunnel options as well if that's a consideration.
So if the cellular console server meets your needs and cost (scale) is
not as important, I think you'll find they all pretty much the same.
On 11/1/2024 3:14 PM, Adam Moffett wrote:
Has anyone used this product? Does it suck?
https://www.wti.com/products/dsm-8dcnm-e-gige-console-server-8-port-
rj45-dual-ethernet <https://www.wti.com/products/dsm-8dcnm-e-gige-
console-server-8-port-rj45-dual-ethernet>
I got spam from this company recently, and purely by chance I was
researching a cellular OOB management option so I got the manual and dug
into it a bit. It has exactly the features I'm looking for. I'm
wondering if by chance anyone here has already bought from this company
and maybe you can save me the trouble of finding out the hard way that
they're terrible.
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