Whats the difference between a switch and a hub.

  • Thread starter Thread starter Kevin C
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Kevin C

I have a small peer to peer sharing network of 4 machines and my 8 port
switch which has been working well for 3 or four years has died. A friend
has said that he has an 8 port hub which I can have. Can I use this? Whats
the difference between this hub and a switch he says he thinks it has to be
configured if so I may be out of luck as we have no info on the hub.
 
On most small LANs you can replace a switch with a hub but the big advantage
to a switch is that when a packet comes in on one port it is not sent to all
other ports on the device (as it is with a hub). This can cause extra
network traffic on that you really don't want to see in larger networks.
Chances are that if you only have 4 machines a standard hub would work just
fine.

J.C. Hornbeck

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In addition, switches are full duplex while hubs are half duplex while hubs
share a single LAN segment, switches have their ports segmented. Also in
switches (depending on capabilities) you might be able to set up virtual
switch ports for security (an other potential reasons).
 
Also checkout one of these links:
http://www.duxcw.com/faq/network/hubsw.htm
http://www.bsnl.in/Telecomguide.asp?intNewsId=2804&strNewsMore=more
http://www.darron.net/network/secondpage.html
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Thanks,
Rakesh Chanana [MSFT]

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