Setting up a Mikrotik 10 Gbps Switch the first time

Since I've done this four times now... and each time it's just a session of reading the docs, searching the forums, etc. until I get everything configured just so, I thought I'd document how I bring up a new MikroTik switch.

I personally love the CRS309-1G-8S+IN, and have three of them running in my homelab. They're less than $250, with 8 10 Gbps SFP+ ports, a 1 Gbps RJ45 port, and a serial console port.

But the best thing for my home use is they are fanless. Blissful silence, outside of a couple beeps the first time you plug it in.

But these 'Cloud Router Switch' models boot into RouterOS. RouterOS is fine and all, but if you just want a managed switch, and have a router elsewhere on the network, SwOS (short for SwitchOS) is where it's at.

First Time Setup

When you plug the CRS309 into power, it will boot, the blindingly-blue¹ power LED will come on, the system will beep a few times, and it will be up.

I plug an Ethernet cable from the router into a computer directly, or into my network.

The router will boot up at the IP 192.168.88.1. So to access it's web UI, you need to switch your computer's network connection to Static IP, and set an IP in the same range (I usually do 192.168.88.2, and leave the 'router' blank).

Visit http://192.168.88.1/, and log in with username admin (no password).

Setting Passwords (for RouterOS and SwOS)

The first thing you should do in RouterOS (click on WebFig at the top to get to the normal UI) is set a secure password. Do that under System > Password.

Log out, and log back in with the new password. Now click on 'Terminal' to go into the RouterOS terminal interface, and enter /system swos password. Enter and confirm the password you'd like to use for the SwOS admin account.

Next I like to upgrade RouterOS to the latest version, since it's nice to not have the Switch end up booting to an old, insecure OS if it ever loses it's settings...

DHCP for RouterOS

But to do that, first you need to get DHCP running (assuming there's a router somewhere on your network that can give the Switch an IP). If you don't have DHCP running, you won't be able to use the GUI to run an update automatically, and that's just annoying.

Go to IP > DHCP Client, and click 'Add New'.

Check the 'Enabled' checkbox, choose 'bridge' for the Interface, and leave all the other settings at their defaults.

Click 'Apply', then 'OK', and wait for an IP address to be assigned.

Make note of this IP address. It's likely that later, when the router boots into SwOS, it will get that IP assigned to it, so that'll be the IP you access (instead of 192.168.88.1).

Updating RouterOS

Now that the box has an Internet connection on your network, go to System > Packages, then click 'Check For Updates'.

It should show an upgrade is available. Click Download & Install and wait for it to upgrade the system.

It should reboot once complete, and the next step is to switch over to SwOS and leave RouterOS in the dust.

Switch to SwOS

After the reboot, you may need to log back into the router, which will still be available at http://192.168.88.1/. Do so, then go to System > RouterBOARD.

Click on Settings, then choose 'SwOS' from the Boot OS menu. Click Apply, then OK.

Now click on System > Reboot, and confirm you'd like to reboot the Switch.

Getting started with SwOS

Now visit the IP address that was assigned to the Switch via DHCP (or if you set up a static IP yourself, visit the IP you configured). You should also switch your own computer back to DHCP if you had set it to be on the same IP range as the MikroTik was by default.

You can log in with the password you created in the Terminal.

From here, I usually upgrade SwOS now. Click on the 'Upgrade' tab, and it's likely there will be a newer version available.

Click 'Download & Upgrade' to run the upgrade, and wait.

After a short time, the Switch should be running the latest version.

Log back in, and if you want to set a static IP address, go to the System tab, and enter one. Make sure to select 'static' for 'Address Acquisition' if you want to force the static IP. Otherwise the Switch will make use of whatever address is assigned from your main router via DHCP.