DCGS-2005 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet Network TAP

Fantastic bit of kit for troubleshooting networks. Used on a daily basis for troubleshooting embedded systems. It's very useful being USB powered as you can run without mains power (handy when you've only got your laptop). It's saved me a fortune in time. The small netgear managed switches can be set up to do a similar thing at a lower cost, but they need mains, and don't have PoE Pass-Through.

This switch works great for troubleshooting network issues with Wireshark or packet capturing software. It runs at gigabit speeds and was easy to get working. It has POE (power over ethernet) pass-thru on 2 ports. Port #1 is mirrored to port #5. To capture packets connect your other switch to port #1 and your capturing computer to port #5. It is powered by USB so no need to lug around a power adapter.

I had a slight data loss problem when using this tap. This data loss stopped when I swapped in the Datacomm etap-2105 (using the same cables and test equipment).

Excellent product if you want to sniff

Small, easy to use and has proven extremely handy troubleshooting data issues on PoE connections with Wireshark. We've used it way more often than I thought we would.

Excellent network tap, works well in production and test environments. Could not verify under extreme bandwidth environments, but has not caused any problems ont he network, and seems to report all packets.