FS S5860-48SC Review 48x 10GbE SFP+ and 8x 100GbE SFP28 Switch

FS S5860-48SC Management

We are going to show the “Cisco-like” CLI in a bit, but by far the more interesting development is the web UI. Here we can go to the default 192.168.1.1 switch IP and connect to the switch. We really wish that FS used a different IP as that is a common SMB gateway IP address. Even 192.168.9.1 or something would make it easier for many to configure. When you go to the default IP over HTTP, it first asks about HTTPS redirection.

Then one can get to a login screen for the web management interface. The default credentials are admin // admin.

A nice feature is that you are immediately prompted to change your password. This is important since it is mandated by many jurisdictions as we covered in Why Your Favorite Default Passwords Are Changing. You cannot put “admin” in again, but it seems like the main requirement is simply having at least 8 characters.

Once you are past this, there is then a Wizard that lets you change the IP address and also the DNS address, and so forth. The default 114.114.114.114 is an IP address owned by China Mobile as a public DNS. Many are familiar with services like Google’s 8.8.8.8 or CloudFlare with 1.1.1.1. We always suggest changing DNS to whatever provider you normally use.

Logging into the switch, we found that at idle, we were using around 13% CPU and 27% memory.

This web interface is really interesting though. For example, one can click on ports and add them to VLANs. We will note here that “Fiber” is misspelled “Fibber” in this UI consistently so that is something you will see. That is consistent with the FS S5860-20SQ switch we reviewed some time ago.

Something we were a bit surprised about is that we could not see the optics plugged into the port in this UI, or at least could not find it easily. For example, this port has a FS QSFP28-IR4-100G 2km optic installed, and it would be great if we could pull up the stats here. Every time we looked, we could not easily find the link.

There are also features such as being able to setup ACLs in the switch.

One can then create access rules in the UI.

There is the ability to add routes through the switch. The Broadcom Trident3 is a higher-end switch chip, so the switch silicon has a lot of high-end features.

Here we have the QOS page. The Broadcom Trident3 is a higher-end switch chip, so the switch silicon has a lot of high-end features. This is an area where a low-cost but relatively unknown solution could be used like the Mediatek Nephos chips that Ubiquiti tried using, but we really like that FS went for the higher-end solution here.

Here is the NFPP settings page.

On the CLI side, one can use either the serial console connector or there is even a web CLI feature. The web CLI is one where a command must be issued at the bottom box then sent. Still, the overall CLI has a “Cisco-like” feel but there are many differences.

For those unfamiliar with the FS CLI, we found something interesting here. The “Command Input” box responds to “?” listing commands with even little context menus with the options. This may not seem like a huge deal but it is certainly there.

Otherwise, the switch CLI is fairly standard in this class of switch. There is certainly a delta between the switch CLI’s functionality and the web interface’s functionality.

With that said, we do not generally publish features for switches because the lists are too long these days. Still, there is also a FS N5860-48SC model that adds a lot of useful features like PFC, MLAG, and VXLAN to name a few. The N5860 model costs about $700 more at the time of this writing but has many features that we know our readers will be interested in. Given that, the S5860 seems to have lower cost but also lower features. We think that may actually make the Web UI more valuable. If one simply needs a switch or two and does not want to learn the FS CLI, then this Web UI brings a Netgear-like easy SMB web UI experience to a relatively higher-end switch. Again, this is certainly something that some will absolutely love, and others will just point to the greater feature set of the CLI and ask what is the point. To us, the point is that not everyone has the same level of networking knowledge and a Web CLI is more approachable.

Next, let us talk performance and optics.