Sams Teach Yourself Network Troubleshooting in 24 Hours, Second Edition

Switching

So, all we know so far about switching is that it isn’t shared. In fact, we’re told that each port on a switch has “dedicated bandwidth.” But those are marketing buzzwords. Let’s delve a bit deeper, starting with the progenitor of the switch: the bridge.

Bridges: Old School Versus New School

In the old days, you’d split your collision domain with a bridge when you had too many Ethernet stations on one segment. What does a bridge do? Well, it splits your collision domain (groan). Seriously, a bridge connects two different network segments, and it does so in a way that not all traffic is shared.

Here’s how it works. Take a look at Figure 10.4 and follow along with me. There are two network interfaces on an old-school bridge; call them ...