Ultimate 100GbE Homelab and SMB Switch MikroTik CRS504-4XQ-IN

At under $699 and 45W, this 100GbE homelab and SMB switch might be the cheapest option around. The MikroTik CRS504-4XQ-IN offers new features in a desktop design and is significantly lower power and quieter than other 100GbE and 25GbE switches in this price range. It may be the perfect #homelab and SMB switch.

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Timestamps
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00:00 Introduction
01:42 Hardware Overview
04:15 First look Supermicro A3SSV-8C-SPLN10F First Look at Atom with 25GbE
06:21 Marvell 98DX4310 Switch and Qualcomm Atheros QCA9531L CPU Management Port
08:03 Internal Hardware Overview
09:28 MikroTik CRS504-4XQ-IN versus CRS518-16XS-2XQ-RM size comparison
09:48 Management with CLI, WinBox, and WebFig GUI Interfaces
12:15 Performance
12:45 Power Consumption and Noise - Maybe no need for Noctua Fans
15:58 100GbE Networks, RDMA, RoCE / RoCE V2, and iWARP Discussion
17:59 Why the MikroTik CRS504-4XQ-IN the ultimate Cheap 100GbE Homelab and SMB switch
19:30 Wrap-up

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Other STH Content Mentioned in this Video
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MikroTik Docs Referenced in Video
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[longnamedude]

Out of my price range, but for what it offers that is some INSANE value!

[xellaz]

I have that 4 port 10Gb MikroTik switch you showed and it rocks! After setting it up, I didn't have to worry about it ever again. I have owned mine for about 3 years now and I only have to restart the switch 3 times just because I upgraded my network and I needed the switch to recognize all the new devices again. It does run a bit hot to touch but it never gave me any problems as far as the reliability of the connection goes.

My only gripe is that the MikroTik interface is not very intuitive and can be a bit confusing. The web interface can be hard to access to if you switch the default access IP to something else. Other than that... it's a very solid 10Gb switch!

[blender_wiki]

thx for the info we are palaning the upgrade of our production studio network from 10Gbe to a new speed. This is an incredible device.

[DigitalSpaceport]

Mikrotik is really changing the game, if they could get RouterOS to really work they could be leaders.

[xD]

FYI, the Marvell Prestera ASICs are natively supported by the Linux switchdev driver, which makes them (along with Mellanox) particularly desirable for those who just want to set up their gear using ordinary Linux tools instead of proprietary CLIs and GUIs.

[berndeckenfels]

A piece on RDMA and requirements in multi layer switches would be interesting

[tthfavor]

I think the intended implementation is as a core switch with downlinks to other switches who then serve the rest of the client PC's and servers rather than a switch sitting between your server and your SAN. In the former case, you would want RDMA of some kind, but in the latter, case the switches generally don't care as they are just forwarding whatever aggregate traffic arrives on their ports.

[tokiomitohsaka]

This is pretty awesome. My home lab is already saturating my 10G networking, so this is suddenly becoming really tempting for this price.

[JasonsLabVideos]

Mikrotik sure has nice reliable switches

[mikestechtalks]

Very cool...
While you're looking at breaking the 100GbE ports down... I am actually looking at this as a cheaper way to get high speed connectivity between nodes in a cluster.
There are a couple of downsides...

1) Price. The price is all over the place $720 - $1200 depending on where you purchase it.
2) Documentation. ( Did not get a good review on Amazon)
3) The processor. As indicated low end processor which could be a limiting factor.

That said, the goal here is to create a higher speed network for a cluster of servers to take advantage of NVMe drives for faster response.

Definitely cool in that the Mellonox / NVidia switches are ~10K (16 ports)

[snap_oversteer]

I'm still running 1GbE everywhere, but this is really interesting for how cheap it is.

[jannegrey]

People always recommended to me - if you want something for networking for your home or small company, especially if you are making something professional - go with MikroTik. They might be more expensive than dirt cheap units, but they are sooo reliable and so, so much over normal specifications. So I assume it is true at least for some segment. That advice was given to me good 15 years ago, so things might have changed.

[Cooper]

Hopefully this product release makes Ubiquiti do a competitive device. Been wanting a small quiet 100GbE switch but stuck in the Ubiquiti ecosystem.

[virtualinfinity]

Very nice review with solid technical comments. I would like to add, if RDMA is a requirement, Infiniband EDR should be considered.

[Egg-seqn]

Stop making videos about Mikrotik products :P. It's getting really hard to find their gear thanks to everyone shedding light on how awesome their stuff is.

[AI-xijk]

Hi Patric, thanks for mentioning RDMA. I wasn’t aware it’s something that might not work. Need to investigate further.

[jammrock]

If you have a NIC with iWARP support (Intel and Chelsio mainly) they are TCP based and don't use PFC. Flow control is still recommended, but not necessary. Some of the RoCEv2 RDMA implementations can now work over lossy fabric. They add a special header to the frame that can track packet loss and retransmit the data, but they are vendor specific last I checked.

[thatLion]

Damn that's like free for 100gbe. ~$200 per port thank you STH for this amazing review

All I can say vsan lab or proxmox

[csabasipos]

06:26 very important information there! On the CCR1074 we tried to use the gigabit management port to forward traffic, and at 300Mbits the router started to randomly crash. MGMT ports are really only for management, although a few years ago it was just marked "ether1" without any clear indication of how limited these ports are. So be aware.

[blackIce]

MikroTik is really really winning my heart with there products, its very hard for me now days as many companies do a copy and past or do something stupid like add port multipliers when not needed like on my asus board B650E-E why the has 8 built on SATA sure some are used for other things as they can be extra pci-e ports but the board has USB Audio, USB RGB.... where MikroTik have paid attention to there design based on need and what works well, or a router on a PCIE <<< love that thing.

Thanks for the video 100GBe is a I wish atm but still its good to know that its there.