Layer 2 and Layer 3 Switching

Freeha Khan
2nd Presentation
IS 8040
Data Communication Theory and Practice
01/18/15

IS8040

Switching
Today in data communications, all switching
and routing equipment perform two basic
operations:
Switching data frames
Maintenance of switching operations
Switching is the process of taking an incoming
frame from one interface and delivering it out
through another interface
Routers use Layer 3 switching to route a
packet, and switches (Layer 2 switches) use
Layer 2 switching to forward frames
01/18/15

IS8040

Switches
Switches are similar to bridges but usually
have more ports
Switches provide a unique network segment
on each port, thereby separating collision
domains
Today, network designers are replacing hubs
in their wiring closets with switches to increase
their network performance and bandwidth
while protecting their existing wiring
investments
01/18/15

IS8040

Switches
10/100-Mbps Ethernet Switches are good
resolution if Ethernet LANs are stretched to
the breaking point under the weight of
new users, servers and high-end applications

Most switches provide shared or dedicated

10/100 uplinks to other switches or network
backbones, and some even provide one or
two dedicated Gigabit Ethernet links for
especially heavy bandwidth requirements
01/18/15

IS8040

Layer 2 Switching
OSI Model
Application
Presentation
Session
Transport
Network
Data Link
Physical

Layer 2 switches,
operate at the
second, or data link,
layer of the open
systems
interconnection
model

01/18/15

IS8040

Layer 2 Switch

Garrett Communications Magnum switches

come with eight to 24 10/100-Mbps ports and
range in price from $599 to $1,199.

01/18/15

IS8040

Layer 2 Switching
Layer 2 switches operate at MAC layer
Layer 2 switches broadcast multicast traffic to all
their ports very detrimental to performance
Static entries can be defined on switches to
control multicast at layer 2 but static entries do
not react to dynamic behaviors

01/18/15

IS8040

Layer 2 Switching
Check incoming network traffic
Keep track of the physical addresses of all
stations attached to their ports
Forward traffic to specific station addresses
according to the forwarding tables
Layer 2 switches can deliver data at wire
speeds because they dont have to examine
individual data packets
01/18/15

IS8040

Layer 2 Switching

Flow of intersubnet traffic with Layer 2 switches and

routers
01/18/15

IS8040

Layer 2 Switching
If the Layer 2 switch does not know where to
send the frame, it broadcasts the frame out all its
ports to the network to learn the correct
destination
When the frame's reply is returned, the switch
learns the location of the new address and adds
the information to the switching table
01/18/15

IS8040

10

Layer 3 Switching
OSI Model
Application
Presentation
Session
Transport
Network
Data Link
Physical

Layer 3 switching
operates at the
network layer

01/18/15

IS8040

11

Layer 3 Switch
Limited-purpose
Layer 3 switches are only available for
Ethernet
They only route IP/IPX protocols
Capable to perform routing at wire
speed: 10, 100, 1000 Mbps
01/18/15

IS8040

12

Layer 3 Switching
Hardware based packet-to-packet IP
routing
Hardware based routers cost less than
traditional software-based routers
They switch non-routable traffic to Layer 2

01/18/15

IS8040

13

Layer 3 Switch

RapierTM 10/100 Layer 3 Switch

01/18/15

IS8040

14

Layer 3 Switching
It examines packet information and
forwards packets based on their
network-layer destination addresses
Layer 3 switching also supports
router functionality

01/18/15

IS8040

15

Layer 3 Switching

Flow of intersubnet traffic with Layer 3 switches

01/18/15

IS8040

16

Difference between Layer 2 and

Layer 3 Switches
The difference between Layer 2 and Layer 3
switching is the type of information inside the
frame that is used to determine the correct
output interface
With Layer 2 switching, frames are switched
based on MAC address information
With Layer 3 switching, frames are switched
based on network-layer information
01/18/15

IS8040

17

Difference between Layer 2 and

Layer 3 Switches
Layer 2 switching does not look
inside a packet for network-layer
information as does layer 3
switching
Layer 2 switching is performed by
looking at a destination MAC
address within a frame
01/18/15

IS8040

18

Difference between Layer 2 and

Layer 3 Switches
Layer 3 switches looks at the frame's
destination address and sends it to the
appropriate interface if it knows the
destination address location
Layer 2 switching builds and maintains a
switching table that keeps track of which
MAC addresses belong to each port or
interface
01/18/15

IS8040

19

References
Switched, Fast, and Gigabit Ethernet, Robert
Breyer and Sean Riley, Third Edition
Business Data Communications, Stallings,
Fourth Edition
http://www.gcn.com
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/
http://www.cisco.com/univercd
01/18/15

IS8040

20

References
http://www.gcn.com/state/vol6_no9/guide/8372.html
http://www.msic.com

01/18/15

IS8040

21