[toast0]

I get my 10g stuff off ebay. x520 dual sfp+ cards are about $10, x540-T2 dual 10g-base-T cards are about $20.

For me, using sfp+ means paying for a transceiver or a DAC, vs using my existing stash of rj45 terminated cables. Some of the ebay cards come with fiber transceivers at no extra cost though. So from that perspective, total cost is about the same either way. And I can use the cabling that's already in my walls.

However, switch pricing is still way in favor of sfp+, and my two 'core' switches have only 2x sfp+ and 2x 10g-base-T, so I use the ports I have.

[WarOnPrivacy]

Buyers of x540 chipsets will want to know they are 1Gb/10Gb. They don't do 2.5Gb or 5Gb.

I have an x540-T2 in my firewall and it's performant if hot. I keep a fan on it.

[jcalvinowens]

I run one 10G to one of these for places where I have machines with 2.5G NICs: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CJMTT9DF

[WarOnPrivacy]

I wouldn't mind a 2nd SFP+ port.

I have a year of heavy use on this switch: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CKP5648P 10Gb from the firewall. 4x 2.5Gb to NAS rest to VMs.

[Toritori12]

I bought a 10/5/2.5/1 gbps MikroTik CRS304-4XG-IN switch relative cheap recently, quite happy with it.