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Netorking Devices

The document provides an overview of various network devices including repeaters, hubs, bridges, switches, routers, gateways, brouters, and network interface cards (NICs). Each device is described with its function, operational layer, and types, highlighting their roles in extending network signals, filtering data, and connecting different networks. Key distinctions between devices such as static and dynamic routing tables for routers, and the functionalities of active, passive, and intelligent hubs are also outlined.

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11 views3 pages

Netorking Devices

The document provides an overview of various network devices including repeaters, hubs, bridges, switches, routers, gateways, brouters, and network interface cards (NICs). Each device is described with its function, operational layer, and types, highlighting their roles in extending network signals, filtering data, and connecting different networks. Key distinctions between devices such as static and dynamic routing tables for routers, and the functionalities of active, passive, and intelligent hubs are also outlined.

Uploaded by

adityavermanda2004
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Network Devices (Hub, Repeater,

Bridge, Switch, Router, Gateways and


Brouter)
1. Repeater – 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. An important
point to be noted about repeaters is that they do not amplify the
signal. When the signal becomes weak, they copy the signal bit by
bit and regenerate it at the original strength. It is a 2 port device.
2. Hub – A hub is basically a multiport repeater. A hub connects
multiple wires coming from different branches, for example, the
connector in star topology which connects different stations. Hubs
cannot filter data, so data packets are sent to all connected
devices. In other words, the collision domain of all hosts connected
through Hub remains one. Also, they do not have the intelligence to
find out the best path for data packets which leads to inefficiencies
and wastage.

Types of Hub
 Active Hub:- These are the hubs that have their own power
supply and can clean, boost, and relay the signal along with the
network. It serves both as a repeater as well as a wiring center.
These are used to extend the maximum distance between nodes.
 Passive Hub :- These are the hubs that collect wiring from
nodes and power supply from the active hub. These hubs relay
signals onto the network without cleaning and boosting them and
can’t be used to extend the distance between nodes.
 Intelligent Hub :- It works like active hubs and includes remote
management capabilities. They also provide flexible data rates to
network devices. It also enables an administrator to monitor the
traffic passing through the hub and to configure each port in the
hub.
3. Bridge – A bridge operates at the data link layer. A bridge is a
repeater, with add on the functionality of filtering content by reading
the MAC addresses of source and destination. It is also used for
interconnecting two LANs working on the same protocol. It has a
single input and single output port, thus making it a 2 port device.
Types of Bridges
 Transparent Bridges:- These are the bridge in which the
stations are completely unaware of the bridge’s existence i.e.
whether or not a bridge is added or deleted from the network,
reconfiguration of the stations is unnecessary. These bridges
make use of two processes i.e. bridge forwarding and bridge
learning.
 Source Routing Bridges:- In these bridges, routing operation is
performed by the source station and the frame specifies which
route to follow. The host can discover the frame by sending a
special frame called the discovery frame, which spreads through
the entire network using all possible paths to the destination.
4. Switch – A switch is a multiport bridge with a buffer and a design
that can boost its efficiency(a large number of ports imply less
traffic) and performance. A switch is a data link layer device. The
switch can perform error checking before forwarding data, which
makes it very efficient as it does not forward packets that have
errors and forward good packets selectively to the correct port only.
In other words, the switch divides the collision domain of hosts,
but broadcast domain remains the same.

5. Routers – A router is a device like a switch that routes data


packets based on their IP addresses. The router is mainly a Network
Layer device. Routers normally connect LANs and WANs together
and have a dynamically updating routing table based on which they
make decisions on routing the data packets. Router divide broadcast
domains of hosts connected through it.
Routing Table
A router reads its routing table to decide the best available route the packet can
take to reach its destination quickly and accurately. The routing table may be of
these two types −
 Static − In a static routing table the routes are fed manually. So it is suitable
only for very small networks that have maximum two to three routers.
 Dynamic − In a dynamic routing table, the router communicates with other
routers through protocols to determine which routes are free. This is suited
for larger networks where manual feeding may not be feasible due to large
number of routers.
6. Gateway – A gateway, as the name suggests, is a passage to
connect two networks together that may work upon different
networking models. They basically work as the messenger agents
that take data from one system, interpret it, and transfer it to
another system. Gateways are also called protocol converters and
can operate at any network layer. Gateways are generally more
complex than switches or routers. Gateway is also called a protocol
converter.

7. Brouter – It is also known as the bridging router is a device that


combines features of both bridge and router. It can work either at
the data link layer or a network layer. Working as a router, it is
capable of routing packets across networks, and working as the
bridge, it is capable of filtering local area network traffic.

8. NIC – NIC or network interface card is a network adapter that is


used to connect the computer to the network. It is installed in the
computer to establish a LAN. It has a unique id that is written on the
chip, and it has a connector to connect the cable to it. The cable
acts as an interface between the computer and router or modem.
NIC card is a layer 2 device which means that it works on both
physical and data link layer of the network model.

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