TN 323 LAN SWITCHING

LECTURE 02: LAYER 2 DEVICES AND

SWITCHING CONCEPTS

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS

❑ Repeater (review)
❑ A repeater operates at the physical layer
❑ Its job is to regenerate the signal over the
same network before the signal becomes too
weak or corrupted
❑ So as to extend the length to which the signal
can be transmitted over the same network

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS

❑ Hub (review)
❑ Physical Layer devices: Is a multiport
repeater
❑ Hubs can be arranged in a hierarchy (or
multi-tier design), with backbone hub at its
top
❑ Hubs form a single Collision Domain

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS

❑ Hub (review)
❑ Hubs do not isolate collision domains: node
may collide with any node residing at any
segment in LAN
❑ Hub Advantage
❑ simple, inexpensive device
❑ Plug-and-play device

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS

❑ Hub (review)
❑ Limitations
❑ Single collision domain results in no increase in
max throughput
❑ Cannot connect different Ethernet types (e.g.,
10BaseT and 100baseT) Why?
❑ Hubs operate using Half duplex mode

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS

❑ Bridge (review)
❑ Link Layer devices: operate on Ethernet
frames, examining frame header and
selectively forwarding frame based on its
destination
❑ Bridge isolates Collision Domains, do not
isolate broadcast domain
❑ They Learn MAC Address of devices and
keep Record on Content Addressable
Memory (CAM)
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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS

❑ Bridge (review)
❑ Bridges learn which hosts can be reached through
which interfaces: maintain filtering tables
❑ When frame is received, bridge “learns” location
of sender: (which interface is connected to)
❑ It records sender location in filtering table
❑ filtering table entry:
❑ (Node LAN Address, Bridge Interface, Time Stamp)
❑ Stale entries in Filtering Table are dropped (TTL can be
60 minutes)

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Bridge Learning: example
▪ Suppose C sends frame to D and D replies
back with frame to C

Step 1:Bridge has no info about D,

o Floods to both LANs,
o Bridge notes that C is on port 1
o Frame ignored on upper LAN
o Frame received by D (By knowing that destination
MAC Address is its own address)

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Bridge Learning: example … (Updated CAM)

C 1

Step 2:D generates reply to C, sends D 2

 bridge sees frame from D

 bridge notes that D is on interface 2
 bridge knows C on interface 1, so selectively forwards
frame out via interface 1

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Switch:
❑ Switches operate at the Data Link layer (layer 2) of
the OSI model
❑ Can interpret address information (Layer 2 Address)
❑ Switches resemble bridges and can be considered as
multiport bridges
❑ Switches divide network in smaller collision domains
(each port is a collision domain)
❑ Do no stop broadcast (Except when configured with
VLAN)
❑ Switches us Application Specific Integrated Circuits
(ASICs), making them much faster in operation
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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Switch:

Reading Assignment
❑ Switching Approach/Methods
❑ Cut Through Mode
❑ Fragment Free Switching
❑ Store and Forward Mode

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Layer 2 Redundant Links & Loop Problem

Bad Design Good Design

▪ A network of roads is a global example of a

redundant topology.
▪ If one road is closed for repair there is likely an
alternate route to the destination
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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Layer 2 Redundant Links & Loop Problem

❑ Redundant Links are required in a network especially

for Uplinks
❑ When on link fails, the other one will work, but what
happens in a switched Network when both links are
up and working?

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Layer 2 Redundant Links & Loop Problem

▪ Switches learn the MAC addresses of devices on their ports so that

data can be properly forwarded to the destination
▪ Switches will flood frames for unknown destinations until they
learn the MAC addresses of the devices.
▪ Broadcasts and multicasts are also flooded

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Layer 2 Redundant Links &
Loop Problem

• Broadcasts and multicasts can cause problems in a switched network.

• If Host X sends a broadcast, like an ARP request for the Layer 2
address of the router, then Switch A will forward the broadcast out all
ports.
• Switch B, being on the same segment, also forwards all broadcasts.
• Switch B sees all the broadcasts that Switch A forwarded and Switch
A sees all the broadcasts that Switch B forwarded.
• Switch A sees the broadcasts and forwards them.
• Switch B sees the broadcasts and forwards them.
• The switches continue to propagate broadcast traffic over and over.
• This is called a broadcast storm (Caused by Switching Loop)

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 DEVICES AND SWITCHING CONCEPTS
❑ Layer 2 Redundant Links & Loop Problem

Qn: How Can we Use Redundancy and Avoid

Loops?

Next Lecture

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