Gateway Turns on Networking Switches

Gateway Inc. on Tuesday made its first foray into networking with the launch of its new Layer 2 network switches.

Chad McDonald, manager of networking products at Gateway, said the new switches are priced for small and medium-sized businesses (SMB), continuing the companys push into that market.

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to read Gateway founder Ted Waitts take on the companys SMB push.

McDonald said Gateways move into networking “is one of the last steps in rounding out our portfolio from the back office to the front office.” Gateway also offers products ranging from servers and storage to desktop PCs.

Prices for the 7200 Series of switches range from $79 for a 16-port, 10/100 switch, to $199 for a 24-port, 10/100 switch with two gigabit ports. The 7400 line ranges from $99 for a 5-port, 10/10/1000 switch, to $399 for a 24-port, 10/10/1000 switch.

The 7600 series of managed switches, geared for businesses with an existing IT infrastructure, come with built-in SNMP for network control. These switches also support 8,000 MAC address table entries, IGMP snooping, port trunking, port mirroring and other bandwidth-control features. Prices start at $399, for a 24-port, 10/100 switch with combo 2 10/100/1000 SFP, and scale up to $799, for a 48-port, 10/10/1000 switch.

The switches, available now, are based on Broadcom Corp. switch and chipset technologies. Gateway plans to launch two more managed switches in the third quarter, said McDonald.

In a separate announcement today, Gateway rolled out new wireless access points, also aimed for SMBs.

Todays announcements mark Gateways latest moves in its push to reinvent itself. Last week the Poway, Calif., company announced it is closing its 188 retail stores and laying off 2,500 employees in the wake of its acquisition of eMachines Inc. Also last week, Gateway announced changes to its management team lineup, adding several eMachines executives to its top ranks.

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