A gigabyte switch connects multiple networkable devices together, with gigabytes being a misnomer as bits are used to describe bandwidth. A switch is capable of organizing data transmissions, enabling faster speeds, and multiple simultaneous communications. Gigabyte switches are commonly referred to as 1,000 for easy comparison, and compatibility is usually indicated by having 10, 10|100, 10|100|1000 or some other combination in the specification. To take advantage of the maximum bandwidth available with a gigabyte switch, it is important to use the correct cabling.
A gigabyte switch is a device, similar to a hub or router, that connects multiple networkable devices together. It is a specific type of the larger category known as a network switch, which comes in varying speeds. Compared to hubs and routers, a switch falls somewhere in between in terms of capacity and cost, with hubs being the most basic and routers the most advanced type of networking device.
Using gigabytes as a prefix in the context of networking is a bit of a misnomer, as traditionally, bits are used to describe bandwidth, while bytes are used to describe storage totals. Thus, more commonly, routers, hubs and switches, for which bandwidth is the key specification, are referred to in terms of megabits or gigabits. Devices such as hard drives, for which total capacity is the useful descriptor, are in megabytes and gigabytes. In most cases, when someone refers to a gigabyte switch, they are actually talking about a gigabit switch.
The main difference between a gigabyte switch, or any type of switch for that matter, and a hub is how they handle so-called collision domains. Hubs are “dumb” in the sense that they don’t assign different addresses to the devices they’re connecting to, and they don’t route network traffic to specific devices. This means that every computer, printer, or other machine sends and receives data along the same lines. While not a problem if there are relatively few devices online, this can become a problem as more and more are added and network speed drops rapidly. A switch is capable of organizing data transmissions; enabling faster speeds, even with a large number of devices using up the bandwidth; and multiple simultaneous communications.
Compared to a gigabyte switch, the oldest and slowest standards of switch bandwidth speeds are 10 and 100 megabits. A gigabyte switch is commonly referred to as 1,000 for easy comparison. Different devices can support different bandwidth speeds, and not all gigabit switches are backwards compatible with 10 or 100 megabit devices. Therefore, when evaluating different switches, compatibility is usually indicated by having 10, 10|100, 10|100|1000 or some other combination in the specification.
To take advantage of the maximum bandwidth available with a gigabyte switch, it is important to use the correct cabling. Cat5 cables aren’t capable of Gigabit speeds, so a home or office with this older cable standard will need to upgrade to Cat5e or Cat6 cable to get the fastest possible speeds. This is an often overlooked and generally more time consuming part of upgrading a network to the Gigabit standard.
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