Short version: I have a PowerConnect 5224, and when I connect a port to my network, all hell breaks loose. People have DNS problems, they lose connection to the file and SQL servers, backups fail. How can a switch cause that much trouble??
Longer version: I used to use this switch a while back when it was the only one I had with Gb on all ports. It worked fine and I never had any trouble. Since then I replaced most of the switches with Netgear, and this one has been sitting on the shelf.
I was just toying with putting it back into service, so a week ago I got it out, connected with the serial port, and did a factory reset. I gave it an ip and plugged a cable into one port so I could use the web interface. Within a few minutes, I started getting calls about all kinds of problems people were having. So I yanked the plug and the problems went away.
I didn't quite believe that it was the switch that did all this, so late yesterday I plugged it in again. Sure enough, problems occurred again! So I stuck a Post-It note on it: DO NOT USE.
It doesn't really matter because I don't need to use this switch. But now I'm just curious as to what was going on. I've never seen a switch cause problems like that before, and this one used to work ok. The only thing that's different now, I suppose, is that it used to be connected directly to the servers, and now it's sitting in my office, so it's piggybacked on one of the Netgear switches.
Anyone seen anything like this? Any hypotheses about what it's doing to cause problems?