2.2 Switching Concepts
A switch listens for frames that enter all its interfaces. After receiving a frame, a switch decides whether to forward a frame and out which port(s). To perform these functions, switches perform three tasks:
- Learning, which means that the switch learns MAC addresses by examining the source MAC address of each frame the bridge receives. Switches dynamically learn the MAC addresses in the network to build its MAC address table. With a full, accurate MAC address table, the switch can make accurate forwarding and filtering decisions. Switches build the MAC address table by listening to incoming frames and examining the frame's source MAC address. If a frame enters the switch, and the source MAC address is not in the address table, the switch creates an entry in the table. The MAC address is placed in the table, along with the interface in which the frame arrived. This allows the switch to make good forwarding choices in the future. Switches also forward unknown unicast frames, which are frames whose destination MAC addresses are not yet in the bridging table, out all ports, which is called flooding, with the hope that the unknown device will be on some other Ethernet segment and will reply. When the unknown device does reply, the switch will build an entry for that device in the address table.
- Forwarding or filtering, which means that the switch decides when to forward a frame or when to filter it, i.e., not to forward it, based on the destination MAC address. Switches reduce network overhead by forwarding traffic from one segment to another only when necessary. To decide whether to forward a frame, the switch uses a dynamically built table called a bridge table or MAC address table. The switch looks at the previously learned MAC addresses in an address table to decide where to forward the frames.
- Loop prevention, which means that the switch creates a loop-free environment with other bridges by using Spanning Tree Protocol (STP). Having physically redundant links helps LAN availability, and STP prevents the switch logic from letting frames loop around the network indefinitely, congesting the LAN.
Frames sent to unicast addresses are destined for a single device; frames sent to a broadcast address are sent to all devices on the LAN. Frames sent to multicast addresses are meant for all devices that care to receive the frame. Thus, when a switch receives a frame, it checks if the address is a unicast address, a broadcast address or a multicast address. If the address is unicast, and the address is in the address table, and if the interface connecting the switch to the destination device is not the same interface on which the frame arrived, the switch forwards the frame to the destination device. If the address is not in the address table, the switch forwards the frame on all ports. If the address is a broadcast or multicast address, the switch also forwards the frame on all ports.
The internal processing on a switch can decrease latency for frames. Switches can use store-and-forward processing as well as cut-through processing logic. With cut-through processing, the first bits of the frame are sent out the outbound port before the last bit of the incoming frame is received. However, because the frame check sequence (FCS) is in the Ethernet trailer, a cut-through forwarded frame might have bit errors that the switch will not notice before sending most of the frame.
Collision Domains |
Broadcast Domains |
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A collision domain is a set of network interface cards (NICs) for which a frame sent by one NIC could result in a collision with a frame sent by any other NIC in the same collision domain. |
A broadcast domain is a set of NICs for which a broadcast frame sent by one NIC is received by all other NICs in the same broadcast domain. |
A fully Layer 2 switched network is referred to as a flat network topology. A flat network is a single broadcast domain in which every connected device sees every broadcast packet that is transmitted. As the number of hosts on the network increases, so does the number of broadcasts. Due to the Layer 2 foundation, flat networks cannot contain redundant paths for load balancing or fault tolerance. However, a switched network environment offers the technology to overcome flat network limitations. Switched networks can be subdivided into virtual LANs (VLANs), each of which is a single broadcast domain. All devices connected to the VLAN receive broadcasts from other VLAN members. However, devices connected to a different VLAN will not receive those same broadcasts because is made up of defined members communicating as a logical network segment. A VLAN can have connected members located anywhere in the campus network, as long as VLAN connectivity is provided between all members.
Layer 2 switches are configured with a VLAN mapping and provide the logical connectivity between the VLAN members.