Hub or Switch

[Dedpuhl]

What is the difference between using a hub or a switch in a LAN?

 

[BCYL]

A switch is full-duplex and a hub is half-duplex... Full duplex means you can transfer and receive data at the same time, while half means you can only receive or send at any given time...

Also with a hub all your PCs share the same backbone, which means they share the bandwidth... for example if you have a 100Mbit hub and 4 PCs connected to it, each PC will only get 25Mbit... But for a switch each PC get their own bandwidth so in the above example they will all get 100Mbit...

With a small LAN you will never tell the difference between a hub and a switch... but for large networks these issues come into play...

I am pretty sure about these info, but I may still be wrong... Can someone confirm or correct me?

 

[andri]

Hub just duplicates the data on all ports (ie, if comp A sends a packet to comp C then computers B,D,E,F will also get the packet). Switch learns which MAC addresses are behind each port and doesn't just duplicate the data (ie, packet goes to C and BDEF lines are clear).

Good for speed and security.