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Exercise 06 - View The Switch MAC Address Table

The document discusses examining a switch's MAC address table. It provides steps to build a network with two switches, record device MAC addresses, clear and observe the MAC table contents on one switch before and after pinging devices from another PC, and verify the pinged devices' MAC addresses are learned.

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Camille Boto
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510 views4 pages

Exercise 06 - View The Switch MAC Address Table

The document discusses examining a switch's MAC address table. It provides steps to build a network with two switches, record device MAC addresses, clear and observe the MAC table contents on one switch before and after pinging devices from another PC, and verify the pinged devices' MAC addresses are learned.

Uploaded by

Camille Boto
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Exercise 06 – View the Switch MAC Address Table

Topology

Addressing Table

Objectives
Part 1: Build and Configure the Network
Part 2: Examine the Switch MAC Address Table

Background
When The purpose of a Layer 2 LAN switch is to deliver Ethernet frames to host devices on the local network.
The switch records host MAC addresses that are visible on the network, and maps those MAC addresses to its
own Ethernet switch ports. This process is called building the MAC address table. When a switch receives a
frame from a PC, it examines the frame’s source and destination MAC addresses. The source MAC address is
recorded and mapped to the switch port from which it arrived. Then the destination MAC address is looked up in
the MAC address table. If the destination MAC address is a known address, then the frame is forwarded out of the
corresponding switch port associated with that MAC address. If the MAC address is unknown, then the frame is
broadcasted out of all switch ports, except the one from which it came. It is important to observe and understand
the function of a switch and how it delivers data on the network. The way a switch operates has implications for
network administrators whose job it is to ensure secure and consistent network communication.

Switches are used to interconnect and deliver information to computers on local area networks. Switches deliver
Ethernet frames to host devices identified by network interface card MAC addresses.

© 2015 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. This document is Cisco Public. Page 1 of 4
Navigating the OS

In Part 1, you will build a multi-switch topology with a trunk linking the two switches. In Part 2, you will ping various
devices and observe how the two switches build their MAC address tables.

Note: The switches used are Cisco Catalyst 2960s with Cisco IOS Release 15.2(2) (lanbasek9 image). Other
switches and Cisco IOS versions can be used. Depending on the model and Cisco IOS version, the commands
available and output produced might vary from what is shown in the labs.

Part 1: Build and Configure the Network


Step 1: Connect the cloud to Router0.
Step 2: Configure PC hosts
Step 3: Initialize or reload switches as necessary
Step 4: Configure basic settings for each switch
a. Configure device name as shown in the topology.
b. Configure IP address as listed in Addressing Table.
c. Assign cisco as the console and vty passwords.
d. Assign class as the privileged EXEC password.

Part 2: Examine the Switch MAC Address Table


A switch learns MAC addresses and builds the MAC address table, as network devices initiate
communication on the network.

Step 1: Record network device MAC addresses.


a. Open a command prompt on PC-A and PC-B and type ipconfig /all.
What are the Ethernet adapter physical addresses?
i. PC-A MAC Address: 0002.1758.3050
ii. PC-B MAC Address: 00E0.8F55.CD5C
b. Console into switch S1 and S2 and type the show interface F0/1 command on each switch.
On the second line of command output, what is the hardware addresses (or burned-in address
[bia])?

i. S1 Fast Ethernet 0/1 MAC Address:

Answer: Hardware is Lance, address is 00e0.a369.7e01 (bia 00e0.a369.7e01)


ii. S2 Fast Ethernet 0/1 MAC Address:

Answer: Hardware is Lance, address is 0001.63a6.ab01 (bia 0001.63a6.ab01)


Step 2: Display the switch MAC address table
Console into switch S2 and view the MAC address table, both before and after running network
communication tests with ping.

a. Establish a console connection to S2 and enter privileged EXEC mode.


b. In privileged EXEC mode, type the show mac address-table command and press Enter.
S2# show mac address-table
Even though there has been no network communication initiated across the network (i.e., no use of ping), it is
possible that the switch has learned MAC addresses from its connection to the PC and the other switch.

© 2015 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. This document is Cisco Public. Page 2 of 4
Navigating the OS

What MAC addresses are recorded in the table? To which switch ports are they mapped and to which devices
do they belong? Ignore MAC addresses that are mapped to the CPU.

If you had not previously recorded MAC addresses of network devices in Step 1, how could you tell which
devices the MAC addresses belong to, using only the output from the show mac address-table command?
Does it work in all scenarios?
The port where the MAC address was learned is displayed in the output of the show mac address-table
command. With the exception of situations where numerous MAC addresses are connected to the same
port, this will typically reveal which network device the MAC address belongs to. When switches are
interconnected, the other switches' MAC addresses are all recorded, which causes this to occur.

Step 3: Clear the S2 MAC address table and display the MAC address table again.
a. In privileged EXEC mode, type the clear mac address-table dynamic command and press Enter.

S2# clear mac address-table dynamic

b. Quickly type the show mac address-table command again.


Does the MAC address table have any addresses in it for VLAN 1? Are there other MAC addresses listed?

There is a MAC Address for VLAN 1

In my case, there are no other MAC Addresses listed aside from the one that I have configured earlier.

Wait 10 seconds, type the show mac address-table command, and press Enter. Are there new addresses in
the MAC address table?
In my case, there are no new MAC addresses added to the table.

Step 4: From PC-B, ping the devices on the network and observe the switch MAC address table.
a. From PC-B, open a command prompt and type arp -a.
Not including multicast or broadcast addresses, how many device IP-to-MAC address pairs have been
learned by ARP?

C:\Users\PC-B> arp –a

Interface: 192.168.1.2 --- 0x6

© 2015 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. This document is Cisco Public. Page 3 of 4
Navigating the OS

Internet Address Physical Address Type

192.168.1.255 ff-ff-ff-ff-ff-ff static

224.0.0.22 01-00-5e-00-00-16 static

224.0.0.252 01-00-5e-00-00-fc static

b. From the PC-B command prompt, ping PC-A, S1, and S2.
Did all devices have successful replies? If not, check your cabling and IP configurations.

c. From a console connection to S2, enter the show mac address-table command.


Has the switch added additional MAC addresses to the MAC address table? If so, which addresses and
devices?

From PC-B, open a command prompt and retype arp -a.


Does the PC-B ARP cache have additional entries for all network devices that were sent pings?

C:\Users\PC-B> arp –a

Interface: 192.168.1.2 --- 0x6

Internet Address Physical Address Type

192.168.1.1 00-50-56-b3-27-d6 dynamic

192.168.1.11 00-1a-e3-cf-b8-c0 dynamic

192.168.1.12 00-25-83-e6-90-c0 dynamic

192.168.1.255 ff-ff-ff-ff-ff-ff static

224.0.0.22 01-00-5e-00-00-16 static

224.0.0.252 01-00-5e-00-00-fc static

239.255.255.250 01-00-5e-7f-ff-fa static

© 2015 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. This document is Cisco Public. Page 4 of 4

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