Product Overview; Gigabit Ethernet Technology; Switching Technology - Atlantis NetMaster G5 Mode D'emploi

This user‟s guide tells you how to install this device and how to connect it to your
Gigabit Ethernet network.

1. Product Overview

1.1 Gigabit Ethernet Technology

Gigabit Ethernet is an extension of IEEE 802.3 Ethernet utilizing the same packet
structure, format, and support for CSMA/CD protocol, full duplex, flow control, and
management objects, but with a tenfold increase in theoretical throughput over
100-Mbps Fast Ethernet and a hundredfold increase over 10-Mbps Ethernet. Since it
is compatible with all 10-Mbps and 100-Mbps Ethernet environments, Gigabit
Ethernet provides a straightforward upgrade without wasting a company‟s existing
investment in hardware, software, and trained personnel.
The increased speed and extra bandwidth offered by Gigabit Ethernet is essential to
coping with the network bottlenecks that frequently develop as computers and their
busses get faster and more users use applications that generate more traffic.
Upgrading key components, such as your backbone and servers to Gigabit Ethernet
can greatly improve network response times as well as significantly speed up the
traffic between your subnets.
Gigabit Ethernet supports video conferencing, complex imaging, and similar data-
intensive applications. Likewise, since data transfers occur 10 times faster than Fast
Ethernet, servers outfitted with Gigabit Ethernet NIC‟s are able to perform 10 times
the number of operations in the same amount of time.

1.2 Switching Technology

Another approach to pushing beyond the limits of Ethernet technology is the
development of switching technology. A switch bridge Ethernet packets at the MAC
address level of the Ethernet protocol transmitting among connected Ethernet or
Fast Ethernet LAN segments.
Switching is a cost-effective way of increasing the total network capacity available
to users on a local area network. A switch increases capacity and decreases
network loading by dividing a local area network into different segments, which
don‟t compete with each other for network transmission capacity.
The switch acts as a high-speed selective bridge between the individual segments.
The switch, without interfering with any other segments, automatically forwards
traffic that needs to go from one segment to another. By doing this the total
network capacity is multiplied, while still maintaining the same network cabling and
adapter cards.
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