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Difference between Router, Hub, Switch?

C

cmai

Member
Could someone please differentiate these for me? I'm quite confused. I use a hub in my dorm room to share a line with my roommate. I use a linksys router at home to share cable internet. My work uses a switch to network its computers and share internet. Seems like all of these do the same thing.


For my next purchase I would like one that can:
1. Share internet
2. Share files
3. Share printing

Thanks for your help,

cmai

 
a router assigns each computer an ip so that way you can share the internet, if i'm not mistaken..😕 and routers also are inherently hubs i guess.. not quite sure what a switch is... perhaps connects 2 networks? ugh i hate how confusing networking can get..
 
A switch is the exact same thing as a hub except all the ports have seperate bandwith were as w/ a hub all the ports share the same amount of bandwith, routers are almost always also switches, the "routing" part of the router is what allows you to share an internet connection, generally routers have a DSP w/ firmware that lets you configure them to act as a dhcp server and a gateway so that all of your PC's have one external IP adress when shareing an internet connection, eg the router connects to the internet and then all the PC's connect to the internet via the router instead of by themselves. Hope this helps clear things up a bit... 🙂
 
a hub sends the same data to all its ports, but only the computer who requested the packet can use it.
a switch, sometimes known as an "intelligent hub" redirects packets to the computer that specifically requested it.
a router is used to connect LANs or WANs, but most home product versions of router also allow distribution of non-routable ips.

if this doesnt make a lot of sense, check out http://www.asante.com/support/routerguide/faqs/hardwared.html
 
Originally posted by: Arcanedeath
A switch is the exact same thing as a hub except all the ports have seperate bandwith were as w/ a hub all the ports share the same amount of bandwith, routers are almost always also switches, the "routing" part of the router is what allows you to share an internet connection, generally routers have a DSP w/ firmware that lets you configure them to act as a dhcp server and a gateway so that all of your PC's have one external IP adress when shareing an internet connection, eg the router connects to the internet and then all the PC's connect to the internet via the router instead of by themselves. Hope this helps clear things up a bit... 🙂
Click to expand...

So then at home I use a router because the Cable company only gives us 1 IP right? At school on the otherhand, each connection gets an IP so the HUB or SWITCH will suffice. And I suppose it is the same thing at work?


What would allow me to share one printer in my house? Do I have to buy a print server?

Thanks for all your help,

cmai
 
To share a printer, you can either share it on the PC it is connected to or purchase a print server or purchase a DSL/Cable router that has a printer port.
 
To share a printer prob. the easiest way is just to set it up as a shared network printer on one of your PC's on your home lan, it's pretty straight forward and the windows printer wizard can walk ya though doing it., your school and or work prob. also have routers but are prob. much more complex networks than the system you have at home, they most likely have multiple routers / hubs / switches and it would depend on how you connect to their network to deterime how you would connect to the internet.
 
Get a router with multiple ports. If you have or might consider a laptop anytime in the next year or two get one that also have a wireless port. If you have a few week keep an eye on the Hot Deals forum here and you can normally pick up a 4-port + wireless for less then $50. My last one was $1.57 after rebate (including tax and the stamp).
 
A hub has no intelligence. Any signal that goes in get's spit back out on all ports. This clogs traffic for the computers that were neither transmitting nor receiving the information.

A hub is not aware or "internet protocol." It's a dumb device that duplicates the data exactly and retransmits it as it is received.

A switch is like a hub that only connects the ports that are transmitting to the ports that are receiving or drops it all together if two computers on the same segment were talking to eachother.

A switch memorizes the addresses (Hardware/MAC addresses, NOT INTERNET ADDRESSES) of all the computers connected to it by watching the traffic flowing through it. It may broadcast the signal through all ports if it doesn't know where to send it. A switch will begin it's transmission as soon as the header portion data containing the MAC address is received without downloading the entire packet (Cut-through switching. Like I started translating your conversation as soon as I heard the first word, not when you finished).

A router is an intelligent Internet Protocol device. This means it IS a computer on the network. It receives an entire Internet packet then decites where it should go (Routes it like a police officer will route you to a detour). A router can therefore decide if a packet should stay on the local network or go out on the Internet. Similarly, it knows which computer to send incomming Internet data to by analyzing the outgoing data to know which PC requested it. This lets you share one Internet connection.
 
I was going to comment but probably just better to tell you to get a home router. Some even have can act as a print server.
 
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