Computer Forums - View Single Post - A switch, and a router....Aren't they the same?

ReikokuKo · 10-05-2007, 06:03 AM

Other than the obvious difference in cost and simplicity of its configurability, I can only take wild guesses.

A hub plays a major role in a star topology which are still quite common today, latency through a hub is much lower than routers and switches. A hub can be used to distribute the backbone, if a switch malfunctions in a network, a major part of the network or the whole network will go down whereas if a hub crashes, the network will not crash with it.

As for diagnostics, if you plug in a network analyzer into a switch, you won't be able to see all the traffic whereas if you were using a hub, you can see all the traffic.

If I didn't give the answer you were looking for...PLEASE TELL ME!!! I WILL lose sleep over this and I treasure my sleep.

10-05-2007, 06:03 AM	#2 (permalink)
ReikokuKo Junior Techie Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Off the grid. Posts: 92	Re: Along came a hub, a switch, and a router....Aren't they the same? Other than the obvious difference in cost and simplicity of its configurability, I can only take wild guesses. A hub plays a major role in a star topology which are still quite common today, latency through a hub is much lower than routers and switches. A hub can be used to distribute the backbone, if a switch malfunctions in a network, a major part of the network or the whole network will go down whereas if a hub crashes, the network will not crash with it. As for diagnostics, if you plug in a network analyzer into a switch, you won't be able to see all the traffic whereas if you were using a hub, you can see all the traffic. If I didn't give the answer you were looking for...PLEASE TELL ME!!! I WILL lose sleep over this and I treasure my sleep.