4 ms·

I wish home grade routers would start using SFP already. Very few of them do. Why is that?

• dylan604 6y ago
  > home grade routers That's your answer. The average home user just wants to plug in a device, type in the wifi code, and never think about it again. Only tech nerds want fiber type connectivity. Putting SFP into home devices would see that SFP sitting unused 99.9999% of the time. Why incur the expense of adding it?
  • cm2187 6y ago
    In fact only tech nerds want wired connectivity at all. Ethernet ports have pretty much disappeared from all laptops.
    • shmerl 6y ago
      Good ones always come with Ethernet port. I wouldn't even consider buying one without it.
      • bartvk 6y ago
        I have a MacBook, which don't come with ethernet for the last 4 years. But I do want ethernet. So I simply dock my laptop, and the docking station of course has ethernet. Of course I do understand that if you're a network engineer, you don't want to screw around with docking stations and dongles and such.
        • shmerl 6y ago
          I don't consider Apple laptops good to be honest. Things should be simple, but not simpler than simple. That said, if some device is simply too thin to accommodate a network port, I don't mind using an adapter through USB-C / upcoming USB4 and etc.
        • msla 6y ago
          > I have a MacBook, which don't come with ethernet for the last 4 years. Exactly: All good laptops come with Ethernet ports.
      • paulie_a 6y ago
        I thought my new xps 13 was good. Guess not
        • shmerl 6y ago
          If it's too thin for it, it's fine - it's a valid excuse. But if it's not and it's just a trend, then no, it's not good.
    • Dylan16807 6y ago
      A direct ethernet port is more about wired connectivity on the go, which is much more of a niche than wired connectivity in general. At work/home you can have a docking station. Or a $20 USB hub that has a builtin ethernet adapter. Ethernet for fixed use is easy. And it's legitimately difficult to fit an ethernet port on a typical laptop (or fragile, if you make it fold).
    • kalleboo 6y ago
      Also to the point that to many many people, "Wi-Fi" has become a synonym for "Internet connection"
      • shmerl 6y ago
        Well, that's until they are hit with higher latency than they want. Wired connection quickly becomes a preference in such case.
        • Legogris 6y ago
          GP is more talking about that the word "WiFi" now has the meaning "Internet connection", not necessarily wireless.
  • shmerl 6y ago
    How is regular Ethernet connector better for it? SFP can as well be same level of easiness, if devices actually supported it. So why not?
    • organsnyder 6y ago
      Consumers would see it as a downgrade: "Wait, I have to buy something else to connect this to my PC?"
      • shmerl 6y ago
        Not really a downgrade it if offers 10 Gbps easily.
        • betterunix2 6y ago
          Is there 10G residential service where you live? I am not sure I have heard of anything above 2G, and even that was just a future plan last I checked.
          • shmerl 6y ago
            Even transferring things between home computers at 10 Gbps is useful. It's not always about external connection.
    • betterunix2 6y ago
      Cost immediately comes to my mind. Given that gigabit service is the gold standard of residential Internet, it is not clear what would be gained for the cost of SFP ports and modules. It is also unlikely that we will see residential service reach 10 gigabit speeds, as most consumer devices would never be able to take advantage of such a thing, and even at 10 gigabit it is probably cheaper to build everything as SoC rather than have separate modules. The only reason I can think of to bother with SFP for residential connections would be GPON, but according to a Verizon tech I asked about this it is far cheaper for them to just use their ONT (which also supports their triple play package), and I was the only person he had met that even had a router with an SFP port. Until you are looking at speeds above 10 gigabit or need to run particularly long cables (beyond 100m, which would almost never be relevant to most consumers) there is no particular need for SFP, and the added cost and complexity is beyond what most consumers want to deal with. Given that most consumer devices cannot come close to saturating a 10 gigabit link and people mostly use wireless links anyway, there is no real point in putting SFP ports in consumer devices.
• Legogris 6y ago
  Netgear, Mikrotik and Ubiquiti have some that at least are in the price-range of "home".
  • shmerl 6y ago
    Too bad there isn't something like Linksys with open drivers that also has SFP.