Thread: Few Physical Media for Ethernet

What’s Ethernet ?

Ethernet is most widely used local area network (LAN) technology. The original and most popular version of Ethernet supports a data transmission rate of 10 Mbps to 100 Mbps.Newer version of Ethernet called “fast Ethernet” and “Gigabit Ethernet” support data rates of 100 Mbps and 1000 Mbps.Each user can transmit continuously at that rate.

Few physical media where Ethernet can run.

1.Twisted pair cable—Now two basic type of twisted pair cable exist Unshielded twisted pair(UTP) and
Shielded twisted pair(STP)

Few feature of UTP cable

• Speed and throughput— 10 to 1000 Mbps
• Average cost per node— Least expensive
• Media and connector size – Lmall
• Maximum cable length—100 m (short) Shielded twisted pair (STP)

Few feature of STP cable

• Speed and throughput— 10 to 100 Mbps
• Average cost per node— Moderately expensive
• Media and connector size – Medium to large
• Maximum cable length—100 m(short)

2.Coaxial cable
Few feature of coaxial cable

• Speed and throughput— 10 to 100 Mbps
• Average cost per node— Inexpensive
• Media and connector size – Medium
• Maximum cable length—500 m(medium)

3. Fiber optic
Feature of Fiber optic

• Very high bandwidth

• Fiber optic cable can be used in environments that make wire cables unusable
• No radio frequency emissions; signals of fiber optic cable can not interfere with nearby electronic devices and can not be detected by conventional electronic eavesdropping techniques.

• Speed and throughput—100 Mbps to 100 Gbps(single mode) 100 Mbps to 9.92 Gbps(multimode)

• Fiber optic is expensive.

• Can not be tapped so better security

• Can be used over great distances

Good post for the newbies ......