Switching and Protocols

Switching is practically invisible (and occurs at layer 2 of the OSI model) and generally not an issue unless you want to create a VLAN or alter the flow of data traffic for some reason. But hey, we gotta cover it because it’s a part of networking, and the switch has greatly improved networking speeds. Also, because there really isn’t much to switching (there shouldn’t be for an IT professional) we squeeze in protocols this week! search for some major switch manufacturers and find the differences between models. Select several models depending on where they go in your project. o Hint – You don’t want to pay for a 24-port Gigabit switch if a room only has two computers that are used for browsing purposes! Similarly, you don’t want to put a 4-port switch in a room that is expected to be turned into a computer lab. Include some expandability into the project, but be realistic. For your task, submit a list of protocols that would be running on your project network, and if you decided to change the ports, please specify.