Switch port settings

Each switch port is characterized by features such as duplex speed, bandwidth, auto-configuration, and Auto-MDIX. In the following sections, you will get to know these features.

Duplex and speed settings

Before we talk about duplex and speed settings, let's first get to know two very important computer networking concepts: bandwidth and throughput. To better understand, think of bandwidth as a water pipe, while throughput is the water that passes through the water pipe. In this analogy, the bandwidth represents the total capacity of a communication channel (in other words, the networking medium), whereas the throughput represents the actual data traffic (often measured in Mbps or Gbps).

For each switch port, bandwidth and duplex are two of the most basic settings. Therefore, it is required that the bandwidth and duplex settings on the switch port match with the device's interface. As discussed in the section Types of communication channels in Chapter 2,Communication in...