Our switch at the office died at 2pm on a Friday and I had no spare
I was stuck at the shop in Dayton with 12 people offline because the 8-port switch just quit, so I drove to Micro Center and grabbed a $40 replacement to get us back up. Now I'm wondering if I should keep a cold spare on the shelf, does anyone here do that or am I just burning money?
Oh sure, and while you're at it just build a whole shelf of spares for every part in the office. Kidding, kinda. A $40 switch sitting in a closet is way cheaper than 12 people standing around for two hours. That's not burning money, that's cheap insurance.