Hub vs Switch Question

[grunge09]

I have a 3com Superstack II Dual Speed 500 24 port 10/100 hub. It works fine for the most part.

I am looking at a Dell Powerconnect 2016 16 port 10/100 unmanaged switch.

I have an 8 PC network. Just added a Replay TV box to that. I have a SMC Barricade 4 port router connecting to broadband. Everything has a 3Com 10/100 PCI Nic. One PC has a 10/100/1000 nic (not a server). PC's are At least 2500+ XP, or 3.2GHz in speed.

I will be using the replay box to serve episodes to various PC's in the house. plus still using the broadband for normal use.

I read that the 3com hub has a 2 port internal switch & sends traffic to the correct port via repeaters to minimize bandwith.

Will I really be gaining any network performace with the Dell 2016 switch??

 

[CoolTech]

I am not sure as to the validity of that hub having switch capabilities, but in general a switch is better than a hub for a number of reasons. A switches ports do not share bandwidth with one another or broadcast traffic to every node for no reason. Each port gets its own bandwidth and is not shared with the rest of the ports. Say you have a 100mbps switch and a 100mbps hub, with the switch all ports get 100mbps(in theory) each, but with the hub, each port has to share the 100mbps, so in your case 100/24. You also have the problem with a hub of all ports defaulting to the lowest speed connection. For instance, if you had 10 100mbps NICs connected and 1 10Mbps connected to that hub, then they would all operate at 10mbps. There are much better explanations than this out there, try www.howstuffworks.com or just a simple google search of "hub vs. switch". Hope this helped.

 

[JackMDS]

As a Network Device Switch is more efficient than a Hub.

In case of a small Network (less than 10 computers) you will not experience any difference.

 

[CoolTech]

Originally posted by: JackMDS
As a Network Device Switch is more efficient than a Hub.

In case of a small Network (less than 10 computers) you will not experience any difference.

umm yes you will, transfering large files over a hub with multiple computers doing transfers simultaneously, YOU WILL EXPERIENCE A DIFFERENCE

 

[JackMDS]

Originally posted by: CoolTech

Originally posted by: JackMDS
As a Network Device Switch is more efficient than a Hub.

In case of a small Network (less than 10 computers) you will not experience any difference.

umm yes you will, transfering large files over a hub with multiple computers doing transfers simultaneously, YOU WILL EXPERIENCE A DIFFERENCE

Log to the following page, and click on Switch vs. Hub. scottmac.net

 

[CoolTech]

lol, one non professional experimentation doesnt mean much, search google, find some real links that prove your point and then talk to me

 

[Agamar]

You will get full duplex connections with a switch that might give you up to ~50% increase in throughput.

 

[gunrunnerjohn]

Originally posted by: CoolTech

Originally posted by: JackMDS As a Network Device Switch is more efficient than a Hub. In case of a small Network (less than 10 computers) you will not experience any difference.

umm yes you will, transfering large files over a hub with multiple computers doing transfers simultaneously, YOU WILL EXPERIENCE A DIFFERENCE

And how often in a small network of less than 10 computers will you actually be doing simultanious transfers of massive data files? Do you just like to argue the point, no matter how absurd?

 

[CoolTech]

Originally posted by: gunrunnerjohn

Originally posted by: CoolTech

Originally posted by: JackMDS As a Network Device Switch is more efficient than a Hub. In case of a small Network (less than 10 computers) you will not experience any difference.

umm yes you will, transfering large files over a hub with multiple computers doing transfers simultaneously, YOU WILL EXPERIENCE A DIFFERENCE

And how often in a small network of less than 10 computers will you actually be doing simultanious transfers of massive data files? Do you just like to argue the point, no matter how absurd?

not necessarily that often, but just saying that a switch is better with high traffic, hubs suck!

 

[ScottMac]

Switches, as implemented , installed, and used by most "home users" is no different than a hub.

As for the "non-professional" test: It was done with the same equipment, same software, and same (actually better) test methodology as the manufacturers and other testing labs. The only difference was the Device-Under-Test was "home" equipment instead of commercial-grade.

We were routinely paid fairly big bucks to test things from our vendors (I worked in an Interoperability Lab) for the vendors and the customers ... as independent / disinterested third parties.. Our vendors, BTW, were Cisco, Nortel, Fore Systems / Marconi, and many others. The tested equipment remains unnamed for legal reasons.

The tests were done on our time, not the company's, for free, to generate some objective data. JackMDS provided the 100 meg Hub (thanks again Jack!).

I gotta get back to shopping.....HO! HO! HO!

FWIW

Scott

 

[narzy]

Originally posted by: grunge09
I have a 3com Superstack II Dual Speed 500 24 port 10/100 hub. It works fine for the most part.

I am looking at a Dell Powerconnect 2016 16 port 10/100 unmanaged switch.

first off, we've had some issues on our network with dell switches and 3com NICs experiencing network crippleing broadcast storms.

I have an 8 PC network. Just added a Replay TV box to that. I have a SMC Barricade 4 port router connecting to broadband. Everything has a 3Com 10/100 PCI Nic. One PC has a 10/100/1000 nic (not a server). PC's are At least 2500+ XP, or 3.2GHz in speed.

Cisco reccomends whenever possible to switch out hubs for switches there are many benifits to having a switch in place of a hub.
1) Full duplex effectively doubleing the amount of data you can transmit at one time (100mb/s up 100mb/s down at the same time)
2) Increasing the number of collision domains. This sounds bad if you don't understand it, however it truly is a good thing, it reduces your collision domain to 2 hosts per connection instead of on a hub where it in your case is 24 hosts per connection, making collisions virtually non existant.
3) layer two routing decisions allowing frames to be directed exactly where they need to go. reducing overall latency.
4) segmentation and microsegmentation of your network. ala your network isn't receiving all traffic when it doesn't need to.

down sides
1) due to the processing that a switch must do to determine the correct route, this can increase latency by a very very small amount.
2) most unmanaged or home use switches use store and forward meaning they store all the bits of a frame until its all there, does error detection then forwards the frame to the correct destination, this is the most latent method however it eliminates any errornous frames.

I will be using the replay box to serve episodes to various PC's in the house. plus still using the broadband for normal use.

I read that the 3com hub has a 2 port internal switch & sends traffic to the correct port via repeaters to minimize bandwith.

Will I really be gaining any network performace with the Dell 2016 switch??

if your going to be doing ANY type of video streaming your going to want and possibly need a switch in place. I personally think that your best option is to go ahead and upgrade to a switch.

 

[gunrunnerjohn]

Since the price of a hub and a switch is almost the same anymore, I doubt that anyone is going to argue that a hub is more desirable! The point was simply that for the typical home network, you wouldn't know the difference. I obviously wouldn't buy a hub, but if I had a hub already and had 3-4 computers in a small network, I also wouldn't run right out and spend money on a switch.