QUESTION

1) Explain why adding a switch makes the network perform better in terms of throughput and
delay.

Unlike hubs, Switches Buffer the frames reaching it. So, Switches share the
bandwidth equally among all the nodes and maintains address tables to forward frames.
Hence it leads to better performance in terms of throughput and delay.

PROBLEM CRAFTING

1) We analyzed the collision counts of the hubs. Can you analyze the collision count of the
Switch? Explain your answer.

As hubs, dont look at the destination address of the frames reaching it and just
forwards them to all other nodes, there is collision count for Hubs. But in case of Switches, it
looks at the destination address and buffer the frames and send them according to the address
table. So, Switches have no Collisions, so no Collision Count.

2) Create two new scenarios. The first one is the same as the OnlyHub scenario but replace
the hub with a switch. The second new scenario is the same as the HubAndSwitch scenario
but replace both hubs with two switches, remove the old switch, and connect the two
switches you just added together with a 10BaseT link. Compare the performance of the four
scenarios in terms of delay, throughput, and collision count. Analyze the results.
Note: To replace a hub with a switch, right-click on the hub and assign ethernet16_switch to
its model attribute.
Figure 1: Only switches scenario
 Figure 2: The graph for delay

Figure 3: The graph for traffic received

 Figure 3: The graph for traffic sent

Conclusion:

From figure 2, it is clear that delay for Only Hub Scenario (Red) is pretty high and for
Hub and Switch Scenario (Blue) it is significantly low compared with Only Hub
Scenario. But the Delay for Hub and Switch Scenario and Only Switches Scenario
(Green) is not that significantly different, as in the earlier case. More over as Switches
cost more than hubs, it is better to use a Hub and Switch combination in the network
than only Switch or only Hub combination.