Switching

Question 1

Something to remember about hubs?

Answer 1

Inefficient and repeats signal to all ports

Question 2

Address Learning

Answer 2

Switches learn the source MAC addresses of a frame and store it in a Content Addressable Memory filter table (CAM) or MAC address table

Question 3

VLANs

Answer 3

Used to logically segment a switch into multiple broadcast domains

Question 4

What are some VLAN benefits?

Answer 4

Broadcast control, improves security, and flexibility/scalability

Question 5

VLAN Database

Answer 5

Where VLAN configurations are stored

Question 6

What information does the VLAN database hold?

Answer 6

VLAN IDs and associated properties to organize and manage network traffic accordingly

Question 7

Port Tagging? What can it distinguish?

Answer 7

Inserting a VLAN identifier into ethernet frames to distinguish between different VLANs on a trunk link

Question 8

How can port tagging enable efficient use of network resources and traffic segregation?

Answer 8

Multiple VLANs can share a single physical connection

Question 9

What is the Ethernet standard for port tagging?

Answer 9

IEEE 802.1Q

Question 10

Trunk Ports

Answer 10

Used to pass multiple VLAN information across switches

Question 11

Switch Virtual Interface (SVI)

Answer 11

Virtual interface on a switch that provides Layer 3 processing for VLANs

Question 12

What does the SVI allow switches to do?

Answer 12

Route traffic between VLANs by assigning IP addresses to VLAN interfaces (enabling inter-VLAN routing on Layer 2 switches)

Question 13

Does a switch need an assigned IP address?

Answer 13

No, but in big networking when you want to login to a switch or for more management of the switch

Question 14

Interface Configurations

Answer 14

Setting various parameters on network devices

Question 15

Native VLAN

Answer 15

Default VLAN on a trunk port that carries untagged traffic

Question 16

What is the native VLAN essential for?

Answer 16

Ensuring that untagged traffic on older devices that do not support VLAN tagging is still routed correctly

Question 17

Voice VLAN

Answer 17

Designed to prioritize and separate voice traffic from other types of data traffic on the network

Question 18

What does Voice VLAN ensure?

Answer 18

QoS for VoIP communications

Question 19

Speed

Answer 19

data transfer rate

Question 20

Why would you configure port speed?

Answer 20

Compatibility with connected devices and optimize network performance

Question 21

Duplex

Answer 21

Communication mode of a network connection

Question 22

Spanning Tree Protocol (STP)

Answer 22

Help prevent switching loops that logically block redundant paths

Question 23

What happens if a network link fails when STP is enabled?

Answer 23

STP recalculates the path and unblocks necessary links to ensure network traffic can still be routed efficiently

Question 24

What does STP help a network maintain

Answer 24

Reliability and performance

Question 25

Port Aggregation

Answer 25

Combine multiple network ports into a single group

Question 26

Link Aggregation

Answer 26

Consolidation of multiple links between switches or between switches and servers

Question 27

What does a port aggregation increase?

Answer 27

Bandwidth and providing redundancy for higher data throughput

Question 28

What does link aggregation enhance?

Answer 28

Overall network capacity and fault tolerance

Question 29

Port Security

Answer 29

Control which devices and how many devices can be connected to a switch port based on the MAC address of the connected host

Question 30

Port Mirroring/Spanning

Answer 30

Redistribute traffic from one port to another

Question 31

What is port mirroring/spanning used for?

Answer 31

Monitor traffic with a packet sniffer or an IDS

Question 32

Maximum Transmission Unit (MTU)

Answer 32

Largest size of a packet or frame that can be sent in a packet or frame network

Question 33

Do MTU packets vary?

Answer 33

Yes, dependent on the physical medium and network protocol

Question 34

What happens if MTU is exceeded? What happens to the network?

Answer 34

This can result in the fragmentation of packets which can reduce network efficiency and increase latency

Question 35

Jumbo Frames

Answer 35

Ethernet frames larger than the standard max of 1500 bytes

Question 36

What happens if all network devices do not support jumbo frames?

Answer 36

This can result in fragmentation

Question 37

What can jumbo frames reduce and improve in high throughput networks?

Answer 37

Overhead and performance