LAN Hardware

Key words
 NIC

 Hub

 Collision

 Bridge

 Switch

 MAC

Bus Topology
 Computers arranged like this do not need any extra network hardware.

 They only need a Network Interface Card (NIC) in each machine and the cables

 However bus topologies have significant disadvantages and are not commonly used anymore

Network Interface Card (NIC)

 Every devices on the network must have a NIC
 It might be a wired NIC with an RJ-45 port
 It might be a wireless NIC
 These will be inside the computer
 Their job is to convert the data from the computer into data that can be carried on the network e.g. electrical signals,
or radio waves and vice versa
 Each NIC has a unique MAC address and also an IP address which is unique in the network (more about these later).
Star Topology
 Once star topologies were developed it became necessary to have a ‘box’ in the middle to deal with the traffic

 The development of LAN hardware that allows computers to connect to each other is the subject of the next few
slides.
A central device
 The following are the possible devices that could be used to direct traffic around the network

 They are in order from oldest and simplest to newest and better performance

 Hub

 Bridge

 Switch

Hubs
BRIDGE
 Used to join 2 LANs together
 Reduces volume of network traffic across network
 Can read the destination address in the data
 Only allows traffic to cross that needs to (forwarding)
 Traffic that does not need to cross is blocked (filtered)
 Use MAC addresses to make that decision
Switch
 Within a modern LAN it is the way data is directed around the network

 It has replaced bridges and hubs in (probably) all networks

 Large networks will have multiple switches

 They use the MAC address of a device to send data only to the device for which the data is intended

Switches Direct Network Traffic

 All network devices have a MAC address

 This is NOT the same as an IP address (more about those later)

 Switches learn the MAC address of devices connected in their LAN

 The MAC address should be unique throughout the whole world (but in practise they need to be unique in the LAN).

 This allows the switch to direct network traffic (data) only to the destination computer – improvement over a hub

Switches prevent collisions

 By only sending data to the correct device switches help to prevent collisions (you should know what a collision is).
 Sometimes collisions could still occur so switches have a feature called buffering
 If some data is going to collide the switch stores the data until the network is clear then sends the data (so no
collision)
 Storing the data temporarily is called buffering
 Because of these two features switches prevent collisions between all directly connected devices