What is the hub?

A hub is a common connection point, also known as a network hub, which is used for connection of all the devices in a network.
The hub has numerous ports.
If a packet reaches at one port, it is able to see by all the segments of the network due to a packet is copied to the other ports.
A network hub has no routing tables or intelligence (unlike a network switch or router), which is used to send information and broadcast all network data across each and every connection.
The network hubs were popular in the past time as they were cheaper as compared to a switch or router.
Nowadays, switches are much cheaper than a hub and provide a better solution for any network.
A hub is no IP address, as it is a dumb device.

Types of Hub

There are three types of the hub that are given below:

Passive Hub:

The passive hubs are the connection point for wires that helps to make the physical network.
It can determine the bugs and faulty hardware.
Simply, it accepts the packet over a port and circulates it to all ports.
It includes connectors (10base-2 port and RJ-45).
This connector is connected to all local area network (LAN) devices.
The advanced passive hubs have AUI ports, which are connected as the transceiver according to the network design.

Active Hub:

It can monitor the data sent to the connected devices.
It plays an important role between the connected devices with the help of store technology, where it checks the data to be sent and decides which packet to send first.
It has the ability to fix the damaged packets when packets are sending, and also able to hold the direction of the rest of the packets and distribute them.
If a port receives a weak signal, but still it is readable, then the active hub reconstructs the weak signal into a stronger signal before its sending to other ports.
It can boost the signal if any connecting device is not working in the network.

Intelligent Hub:

These hubs have some kinds of management software that help to analyze the problem in the network and resolve them.
It is beneficial to expend the business in networking; the management can assign users that help to work more quickly and share a common pool efficiently by using intelligent hubs.
However, it offers better performance for the local area network.
And with any physical device, if any problem is detected, it is able to detect this problem easily.

Features of Hub

It acts with shared bandwidth and broadcasting.
It includes only one collision domain and broadcast domain.
It works at the physical layer of the OSI model and also offers support for half-duplex transmission mode.
It cannot create a virtual LAN and does not support spanning tree protocol.
It has a high transmission rate to different devices.

Applications of Hub

Functions of HUB

Hubs work as a central connection between all network equipment and handle a data type, which is called frames.
Hub transmit it to the port of the destination computer after amplifying it.
A frame is passed to each of its ports in the hub, whether it is destined only for one port.
It does not decide the port it should be sent.
Therefore, a frame has to transmit to every port.
For this reasons only, it generates a lot of traffic on the network and can be caused to damage the network.
The hub is slower as compared to standard switch as it is not able to send or receive information at the same time, but a switch is more costly than a hub.

Advantages of Hub

Disadvantages of Hub

It has no ability to choose the best path of the network.
It does not include mechanisms such as collision detection.
It does not operate in full-duplex mode and cannot be divided into the Segment.
It cannot reduce the network traffic as it has no mechanism.
It is not able to filter the information as it transmits packets to all the connected segments.
It is not capable of connecting various network architectures like a ring, token, and ethernet, and more.

Difference between a Hub and a Switch

It is a passive device. But switch is an active device.
It is not an intelligent device. But a switch is an intelligent device.
In the hub, the transmission mode is Half-duplex. But in switch, the transmission mode is full-duplex.
It uses electrical signal orbits. But Switch uses frame & packet.
A hub is not capable of storing MAC addresses. But a Switch uses accessible content memory, which can be accessed by application-specific integrated chips (ASIC).
A hub contains a single domain of collision. But in switch, several ports include separate collision domains.
A hub works at the physical layer of the OSI model. A switch works at the data link layer of the OSI model.
In the hub, mostly collisions occur in setup. In full-duplex switch does not occur collisions.
The speed of the hub network is up to 10 Mb per second. The speed of switch is 10/100 Mbps, 1 Gbps, and 10 Gbps.

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