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Re: [LUG] OT DUMB QUESTION PROBABLY - NETWORKING



On Sun, Sep 14, 2003 at 07:02:12PM +0100, John Daragon wrote:
> On Sunday 14 September 2003 18:48, paul wrote:
> > What precisely is the difference between a hub and a switch,  on ebuyer
> > they got networking products, and you can get a switch and network card
> > together.
> 
> A hub just rebroadcasts all of the packets that arrive at each socket, and 
> (typically) requires all of the sockets to be running at the same speed 
> because it doesn't have anything flashy like memory.  A switch, however, can 
> buffer frames, learns which NUA is on which port and routes packets more or 
> less intelligently. So they tend to support better-performing networks. 
> Because they can buffer data, they also get to handle (say) 10Mb/s and 
> 100Mb/s connections at the same time.

A switch also tends to be able to handle full duplex connections
and to allow multiple groups of ports to communicate at the same
time. 

A hub is effectivly a multiport repeater, a switch is effectivly
a multiport bridge.

> 
> >
> > I am using a router and hub and can play games over the network.
> >
> >
> > One of the kids at the rugby club was asking me about networking, I am just
> > not sure on the hub / switch difference, would friends be able to take
> > laptops round and just plug in to the network.
> >
> >
> > Also given the possible distance between his two computers,
> >
> > a) whats the max length of cat 5 we can use.
> 
> erk. Isn't it 200m ?

100m is the absolute maximum cable length.

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