You are completely right! Oversight on my part.
However I take it Trodes and a DataJack are the only way you could accomplish this and there would be a couple of sacrifices to this.
1) As Trodes and a DataJack apparently don't have a device icon of their own, and when you go into the matrix you don't create a persona you can use it (to your range and noise reduction) to reach out to your comlink further away and connect to it
2) You couldn't do it with a comlink, deck, RCC etc. as once you hop into it you immediately assume your persona on that device (which happens to be on you). So you can't use a comlink, to connect to another comlink further away, and form your personal around that farther comlink
3) You couldn't operate your external distanced comlink running silent. Trodes and DataJacks don't have their own data processing (to my knowledge), so you couldn't matrix perception for it (unless being the owner of the device makes it visible to you whilst it runs silent, though unlikely)
Question. Can you not use a device without forming a persona? The Send Message matrix action says you can send longer messages when using a DNI or through AR. Can you not just type on the screen and have the device send the message to another device. No persona involved?
If you can, then the switch board would remain an options for sending messages through silent running devices with no persona involved.
You can also tell I'm not that great with matrix stuff. Magic I'm better with
Thanks for fielding all my questions.