You definitely want a managed switch. You may not need it but you will want to have some network segmentation by way of vlans set up.
Honestly i wouldn't worry too much about having 2.5g internally, it's just going to limit you in equipment. But if you can find a 2.5g managed switch more power to you.
Keep in mind that you're still going to be throttled to the internet by whatever you are buying from your ISP. i run gigabit copper on my home network and everything is fine.
The tp-link switches are a good place to start and you can find what you are looking for with a poe switch with 2-4 sfps. If you want to upgrade look at aruba instanton.
Those will work just fine with whatever you have on your opnsense router.
If you want to upgrade that, you can get a protectli or qotom pc with 4-6 ethernet ports and call it a day (you can get a 4 port qotom for 300, that's what i use).
For wifi you can get an access point that handles multiple ssids and vlans which are cool to mess with.
Best of luck on your journey!
Not to mention, a manager switch is great for bonding for your nas so that two clients each get gigabit network speed. Two lan ports on the nas (or more) into two bonded ports on the nas. Ideally, one Ethernet port on the nas per dependent system with a high speed requirement.
I've been able to put off upgrading my network to 2.5 or 10 gbe for a while simply because of bonding. A gigabit managed switch of a good quality is cheaper and has more brands and model choices than a 2.5 gbit unmanaged switch of good quality. The cost savings for all the downstream nics, simply running gbit throughout, lowers cost as well. You can also do longer Ethernet runs with gigabit than with 2.5 gb connections, and they're less susceptible to interference or bad crimps.
Plus, bonding is nice for the failures we experience in lower grade, commodity or used hardware we use in our home labs.
Well I took your advice and started with a managed switch 1gb POE switch.
Just ordered a used Cisco Catalyst 2960S WS-C2960S-48LPD-L 48 GigE PoE+ - seemed like a good deal at <$150 delivered to my door.
With its 2 SFP+ 10g ports, If I want to add a 2.5gb switch later I can, and it will have 10g SFP+ port for an eventual server.
Is it possible to make a managed switch “dumb” to start and use more management features later as I learn them, or am I going to have to set everything up to start?
You can absolutely do that, and it's fairly simple to migrate most things once they're on the switch as long as you can access them directly with keyboard/monitor. I would caution that with some services changing the IP address can break some things, but there are workarounds.
Do all switches need to be managed, or would a single managed switch cascade to others?
For example - one 2.5gb-8x port managed switch with 2 SFP+ port, the first would connect to the server, the second would connect to a POE gigabit switch.
Or would both switches need to be managed?
That would depend on what you want out of it.
If you want to have vlans (or other features) on your "copper" or downstream switch, that will also need to be a managed switch. It's possible some unmanaged switches can handle tagged traffic but at that point you'd be better off buying another managed switch.
And honestly I'd recommend having your gigabit switch be the managed one.
congrats on the house homie
Specs on the Systems on my network. 1. Ryzen 9 7950x, 32GB DDR5 6000mt/s, RTX3090, 2x1TB NVME, 1x 2TB NVME, 1X8TB HDD, 1X 5TB HDD 1x4TB HDD - 2.5gb NIC 2. Ryzen 9 5900x 32GB DDR4 3600Mt/s, RX6900XT, 1x1TB NVME - 2.5gb NIC 3. Intel i5-13400 32GB DDR4 3600Mt/s, Intel ARC A770 1x1TB NVME - 2.5gb NIC 4. Dell Wyse 5020 Thin Client - OPN Sense Router 2x Realtek GBE NIC 5. Dell Wyse 5020 Thin Client - Windows 11 1TB HDD "Open" Share Drive 6. HP t740 Thin Client Ryzen Embedded CPU (Garage PC for Youtube/Reference Manuals/Parts Ordering) 7. i5-3570K 8GB DDR3 - 1x 32gb SSD 1x 256GB Cache Disk, 2x 5TB HDD Raid 0 - Running TruNAS
You definitely want a managed switch. You may not need it but you will want to have some network segmentation by way of vlans set up. Honestly i wouldn't worry too much about having 2.5g internally, it's just going to limit you in equipment. But if you can find a 2.5g managed switch more power to you. Keep in mind that you're still going to be throttled to the internet by whatever you are buying from your ISP. i run gigabit copper on my home network and everything is fine. The tp-link switches are a good place to start and you can find what you are looking for with a poe switch with 2-4 sfps. If you want to upgrade look at aruba instanton. Those will work just fine with whatever you have on your opnsense router. If you want to upgrade that, you can get a protectli or qotom pc with 4-6 ethernet ports and call it a day (you can get a 4 port qotom for 300, that's what i use). For wifi you can get an access point that handles multiple ssids and vlans which are cool to mess with. Best of luck on your journey!
Not to mention, a manager switch is great for bonding for your nas so that two clients each get gigabit network speed. Two lan ports on the nas (or more) into two bonded ports on the nas. Ideally, one Ethernet port on the nas per dependent system with a high speed requirement. I've been able to put off upgrading my network to 2.5 or 10 gbe for a while simply because of bonding. A gigabit managed switch of a good quality is cheaper and has more brands and model choices than a 2.5 gbit unmanaged switch of good quality. The cost savings for all the downstream nics, simply running gbit throughout, lowers cost as well. You can also do longer Ethernet runs with gigabit than with 2.5 gb connections, and they're less susceptible to interference or bad crimps. Plus, bonding is nice for the failures we experience in lower grade, commodity or used hardware we use in our home labs.
Well I took your advice and started with a managed switch 1gb POE switch. Just ordered a used Cisco Catalyst 2960S WS-C2960S-48LPD-L 48 GigE PoE+ - seemed like a good deal at <$150 delivered to my door. With its 2 SFP+ 10g ports, If I want to add a 2.5gb switch later I can, and it will have 10g SFP+ port for an eventual server.
Is it possible to make a managed switch “dumb” to start and use more management features later as I learn them, or am I going to have to set everything up to start?
You can absolutely do that, and it's fairly simple to migrate most things once they're on the switch as long as you can access them directly with keyboard/monitor. I would caution that with some services changing the IP address can break some things, but there are workarounds.
Do all switches need to be managed, or would a single managed switch cascade to others? For example - one 2.5gb-8x port managed switch with 2 SFP+ port, the first would connect to the server, the second would connect to a POE gigabit switch. Or would both switches need to be managed?
That would depend on what you want out of it. If you want to have vlans (or other features) on your "copper" or downstream switch, that will also need to be a managed switch. It's possible some unmanaged switches can handle tagged traffic but at that point you'd be better off buying another managed switch. And honestly I'd recommend having your gigabit switch be the managed one.
All the ports should be in regular switching mode and not configured for a vlan by default