Managed and unmanaged media converters are two important types of media converters. The following points will help you understand it better.
Managed Media Converters: These are advanced media converters, which possess features such as advanced network monitoring, remote configuration, fault detection, and other functions. They feature Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) agent, which reports their performance status to the Network Management System Manager (NSM) manager. The NSM runs on the administrative computer. These media converters are widely used in corporate networks such as RADIUS, TACACS+, LDAP, Kerberos, RSA, and NIS. Managed media converters support SSH, SNMPv3, Telnet, and HTTPS, thereby assuring secure management sessions.
Unmanaged Media Converters: These media converters enable simple communication between two systems and they are not equipped with advanced features for monitoring or fault detection. Also, you cannot use it for setting up network configurations. Unmanaged media converters are ideal for plug and play or DIY fiber network cable installations. These media converters can be set through a hardware DIP switch.