Science today, providing a lot of technical gifts to mankind science has proved to be a boon for the entire society, with the low accessibility now only being recorded in the books of history. Networking plays a very important role in sustaining the prevailing reign of technology. Interestingly, internet devices such as hubs, switches, MAU, repeaters, bridges and routers have been playing the role of protagonist in augmenting the importance of networking. Hubs or Ethernet hubs, normally take the help of Ethernet connections to join computers with the other devices on a local area network (LAN), such as workstations, print servers and file servers. There are a lot of advantages of hubs which mainly includes its simplicity, speed and cost. For the buyers who opt for a few devices on their network in the wake of limited data transfer generally choose hubs for its cost effectiveness. As only a limited amount of data transfer takes place packet collision do not possibly occurs. Another advantage of hubs is that they are simple to use. They simply broadcast the data received on various devices on the network. Later the device decides which information is meant for its use. Yet another advantage that hubs provide is the speed. Due to the minimal amount of processing performed by them they are able to communicate at much quicker rate. The disadvantages of hubs can be their inability to allow expansion. With the increase in the number of devices the data transfer rate drastically reduces. Traffic problem and packet collision are other problems associated with it. Network switches on the other hand are used to connect multiple devices to a single network. Its advantages are packet handling of the network switching and provision of technique for collision management in the network. Due to a greater bandwidth that switches provide the network performance remains unaffected by multiple devices. Also, if a device fails in the entire network the switch does not allow it to affect the other devices and hence the entire system does not halt. The disadvantages on the other hand, include difficulty in installation and use, requirement of extensive training for its repair and its vulnerability to cyber-attacks such as IP spoofing. Moreover, Media Access Unit (MAU) is an adapter or a standalone device used to connect network device to token ring. An important advantage that MAU provides is the ability to bypass a failed component when in a ring. The structure is highly organised and has an equal access of resources to all the devices. Also, there is no need for the network server to connect between the workstations. Its disadvantages on the other hand include high dependence on the network wire and expensiveness as compared to other devices.(‘ Network Switches vs. Hubs’)
Moreover, repeaters are the most simple and commonly used networking device. Basically, repeater amplifies low strength signal into high strength. As it is simple and commonly used the first advantage of the repeater is that it is very cheap and easy to implement. The other advantage coming in its bag is that it enables large networks along with helping the network to expand as it amplifies the signal before it gets dead. It has some disadvantage as well; it cannot reduce the traffic in the network, it cannot segment the network, too many repeaters cannot be used in a single network as they may create large amount of noise in the network.
Another device which works at physical layer is bridge. The main function of the bridge is to enable two similar networks to connect to each other. It also enables network to connect to different media. It reduces network traffic, and also helps in solving the problem of bandwidth and collision. The major advantage of bridges is its simplicity to configure and cheapness. Its disadvantage can be the property of not being able to handle multiple paths.
Yet another device router is used to remove the corrupt packets. It also provides a suitable path to transfer packet, performs calculations and connects different networking architectures such as MAN to WAN, Ethernet to Ethernet. The most significant advantage of router is that it searches for the shortest path to transfer data without disturbances. It also provides IP Addressing so as to assign unique IP addresses to the computers in the network. It too has certain disadvantages. The first disadvantage is that it is very costly and difficult to configure. Another disadvantage is that it is very slow as it performs some complex calculations.
(“Image taken from www.conceptdraw.com”)
References
eBay, (2014). Network Switches vs. Hubs: Advantages and Disadvantages. [online] Available at: http://www.ebay.com/gds/Network-Switches-vs-Hubs-Advantages-and-Disadvantages-/10000000177330010/g.html [Accessed 21 Nov. 2014].
Ianswer4u.com, (2014). Ring Topology : Advantages and Disadvantages. [online] Available at: http://www.ianswer4u.com/2011/05/ring-topology-advantages-and.html#axzz3JjZyWG00 [Accessed 21 Nov. 2014].
Searchnetworking.techtarget.com, (2014). What is multistation access unit (MSAU)? - Definition from WhatIs.com. [online] Available at: http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/definition/multistation-access-unit [Accessed 21 Nov. 2014].
