Network Equipment

For quite a while, I used to collect Network Gear – telecommunications and global networking always held a fascination for me. In addition, I was often surprised bigger companies were unable to invent anything, and instead acquired start-ups – which I witnessed many times, such as when Cisco acquired Kalpana and Grand Junction, rebranding their switching equipment; or the Cisco acquisition of NTI’s PIX firewall; or when FORE acquired Alantec.

Since I had so much networking gear, I ended up often lending some of it to start-ups I was working for – especially if they were pre-serious-funding (such as these Chipcom high-density-port switches to Bartertrust at the early stage, when i was employee #18).

Here are just a few pictures of the gear – in my five-bedroom house in Silicon Valley I had to upgrade the power feed, and used two rooms just as server rooms.