April 2013
Beginner
80 pages
1h 57m
English
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Chapter 4. Special-Purpose Switches
Previously, we described basic switch operation and features. Ethernet switches are building blocks of modern networking, and switches are used to build every kind of network imaginable. To meet these needs, vendors have created a wide range of Ethernet switch types and switch features. In this chapter we cover several special-purpose switches, many developed for specific network types. The Ethernet switch market is a big place, and here we can only provide an overview of some of the different kinds of switches that are available.
We begin with a look at various kinds of switches sold for specific markets. There are switches designed for enterprise and campus networks, data center networks, Internet Service Provider networks, industrial networks, and more. Within each category there are also multiple switch models.
Multilayer Switches
As networks became more complex and switches evolved, the development of the multi-layer switch combined the roles of bridging and routing in a single device. This made it possible to purchase a single switch that could perform both kinds of packet forwarding: bridging at Layer 2 and routing at Layer 3. Early bridges and routers were separate devices, each with a specific role to play in building networks. Ethernet switches typically provided high-performance bridging across a lot of ports, and routers specialized in providing high-level protocol forwarding (routing) across a smaller set of ports. By combining those ...
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I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.