Making use of a Switch

adding a switch does not extend the allowable length of your cable. i think what you want is a repeater (boosts the signal)...maybe if you checked out www.blackbox.com you might get some help there...i don't know about your question about dedicatingbandwidth to certain ports. might be a router thing...if this was my problem to solve i probably would surf the website of the existing switch mfg (3com? nortel?) and look for equipment that fit my requirements...or call the sales reps, they can be gold mine of info...

"Manageable" switches will allow you to allocate bandwidth... but "no" it is not automatic. Not all switches are manageable; you pay for this ability. The software that comes with manageable switches is want permits the "manageability" of these devices. You need to seek "manageable switches" in order to have control over bandwidth allocation.

About your second paragraph, read this section:
http://www.darron.net/network/secondpage.html

Essentially, whether to use a hub or a switch will depend on the number of users and traffic. If a small network, a hub is best and can be used to extend your network. If a large network, you will probably want to use both a hub (to extend the network) and then a switch to control traffic overflow or bottlenecks.

I think you coureosed with different definitions.

1. "Dedicated bandwidth". This dows not mean that you dedicate or assign bandwidth to specific port.

How HUB works: let's imaging that we have 2 rooms full of people and we have only one phone in each room. Everybody wants to talk to each other. But at a moment of time only one pair can talk. It's "shared media", and real "bandwidth" depends on how many people wants to talk.

How SWITCH works: same rooms, but everybody have his own phone. Everybody can talk independently and simultaneously. Everybody has his own media and "full bandwidth".

2. Extending your network for more than 100m:

Best thing I can recommend - Fiber Optic Links.

1. MultiMode Fiber is pretty cheap and very reliable. Same companies, who make Ehternet wiring can install Fiber.

2. Many switches have embedded Fiber interfaces (or expansion slots). Even if not, you may find media converters with 2 ports - Ethernet and Fiber.

3. Less desirable solution is Wireless. Actually it's more flexible, but security consideratuion is still very high. Plus, I wouldn't recomend to put critical stuff on wireless links.

4. There are such thing as "long distance Ehternet, but I am not sure if it's standardized yet.

If you have more question, send me e-mail.

Good luck.

I would like to share the Switch and Hub difference before answering the query:
Switch:
1. Improves performance by offering each workgroup 10or100Mbps of bandwidth; Fast Ethernet ports provided by the switch allow high-speed server and backbone connections, eliminating bottlenecks.
2. Enables scalable bandwidth: the more ports on the switch, the more bandwidth is available; aggregate bandwidth equal the number of ports times 20-Mbps (full duplex), divided by two.
3. Allows network manager to dedicate 10or100Mbps connections to users who need them most
4. Reduces collisions: user groups on a single port will produce collisions, but considerably fewer than if all switch users were still on a single shared 10-Mbps Ethernet
5. Provides higher total throughput than a hub because it can support multiple simultaneous conversa-tions. Eg, in an 8-port Ethernet switch, four pairs might be communicating simultaneously, for 40-Mbps throughput, or 4 times more bandwidth than a 10-Mbps Ethernet hub. The more ports on a switch, the more aggregate bandwidth.

Queries:
A) Dedicated Bandwidth:
answer: No it is not possible to allocate the bandwidth of nx64kbps on each port of switch.
Yes switches could detect NIC with 10 or 100Mbps speed automatically. And see point 5 for aggregate Bandwidth.
B) distance 100m
answer: You can't go beyond 100m distance as signals can travel 100m on UTP cable even if you use Hub or switch. You need to use another Hub or switch after 100m to strength signals. Switches are mandatory in the 100Mbps networks when cascading of more than two hubs are required. U can even use fibre link which support more than 100m. U have to use UTP to fibre converter if your hub doesn't have fibre port.

Fiber to the remote locations and switches at the remote.

Good Luck Lee

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