Netgear and Nortel aren't even in the same league. Nortel is commercial level stuff, Netgear is generally considered SOHO or home equipment. I like Netgear for cheap stuff...but in your case, I'd go ...
At an office where I work some of the time, their LAN has 3 switches (2 of them netgear FS116 10 / 100 16port - The other one is an 8 port that I don't remember the make of) Occasionaly (say once ever ...