Comments on: Your Network Is Stupid - Hubs vs. Switches

By: Your Network Sucks - Apparently Mine Does Too! | Samanathon.com

Your Network Sucks - Apparently Mine Does Too! | Samanathon.com — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 14:42:28 +0000

[...] I hope by now, all of you know about Remote Desktop. I mean, you have to be an idiot to not know that you can interact with another desktop from a remote computer, but then again, some people are using hubs… [...]

By: msdanielle

msdanielle — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 01:23:02 +0000

great post. i feel informed and tense all at the same time. hope to see you post again soon.

By: Kelly Cho

Kelly Cho — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 22:34:21 +0000

You got a great writing style AngryNetworker! It was funny AND informative… hard to find that combo these days.

By: Saman

Saman — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 16:29:11 +0000

Unfortunately, the AngryNetworker and I use them all of the time!!!

By: Jez

Jez — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 22:05:37 +0000

Cisco certainly don’t push hubs on their certification courses, and I havent heard of anyone installing a hub for a long time. Im am sure there are many in use, but I would be very surprised if people are still installing them.

By: Saman

Saman — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 18:17:08 +0000

No kidding, I knew that was JP as soon as I read it!

By: AngryNetworker

AngryNetworker — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 17:57:05 +0000

You bore me
haha
only jeremiah

By: AngryNetworker

AngryNetworker — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 16:39:28 +0000

Did you know there are people still using token ring

By: AngryNetworker

AngryNetworker — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 16:38:15 +0000

Just because they are out of date doesn’t mean they aren’t still being used in poorly designed networks.

Just got to linksys.com for example, they’re still making *new* hubs

So no, it’s not several years out of date. It’s still not phased out entirely. You should get out more and see them in action

By: Jez

Jez — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 09:26:30 +0000

Its a decent article but the hub stuff is several years out of date, as already mentioned hubs are rarely seen for sale these days, even for personal use, I havent seen one used commercially for many years….

By: Saman

Saman — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 04:04:03 +0000

Yes, it’s one of the smaller features of the Firestats plugin.

By: Saman

Saman — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 04:01:12 +0000

True, but the prices have been the same now for years!

By: AJ bores me

AJ bores me — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 01:35:52 +0000

So, I don’t understand…..I thought hubs were bad because they required more power so as to shout louder to the other ports. And thats why switches are cheaper….because they whisper and in turn use less power!!

Anyway, this article still doesn’t say whether or not he ever finished ghosting his computers with the use of a hub….or a switch??!! Or is the truth that it didn’t work on either because the F-up was located somewhere else in the server room…..er uh….did I say that?? I think someone just has an anger management issue with hubs!!

And, BTW, do you really have the need to memorize the 7 layers of the OSI reference model? It’s a REFERENCE MODEL….you REFER to it….not memorize it.

HUBS=BEST

By: Ajith

Ajith — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 20:18:39 +0000

And dude how did you put that “OS + Browser” recogniser in the comment section, is that a Wordpress plugin..

By: Ajith

Ajith — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 20:16:39 +0000

Hmm please tell us if the http in he link fild will be auto matically added else the links would be as funny as the one I have got on the prvious comment i posted

By: Ajith

Ajith — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 20:09:29 +0000

The post was as hilarious as it was informative..
Really great sense of humor you have dot AngryNetworker..
BTW can yo just tell me your opinion about my funny feed icons …

By: HMTKSteve

HMTKSteve — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 19:55:45 +0000

Can you even buy a hub these days?

The only reason people used hubs in the first place was because they were cheap. Back in the day you could either spend $75 on a four port hub or $1,000 on a switch… Which one would you buy?

By: Ed Lau

Ed Lau — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 06:29:49 +0000

I hate setting up networks…

By: Zach Malmgren

Zach Malmgren — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 01:56:25 +0000

Hey AngryNetworker,

Great article. Very funny stuff… I just have a couple of things to nit-pick, feel free to call me jerk for doing it.

You mention full and half duplex in the same paragraph you are explaining the inner workings of a hub. It gives the impression that you have a choice in the matter when it comes to hubs, and you don’t. All hubs are half-duplex (which I think is what you were saying… it was just a little hard to tell) while full-duplex is available in switches (provided it is a newer switch and the host NIC supports it).

Also, (yes I know my level of “anality” knows no bounds) you mention that CSMA/CD helps avoid collisions, but what I think you meant was that it detects collisions and provides a mechanism to recover from them (which you detailed).

Ok ok ok… I’m done splitting hairs on the gnat’s ass. There is still one reason that I am aware of to use a hub over a switch (or rather in conjunction with a switch), and that is when you have 2 or more servers using MS-NLB (Microsoft Network Load Balance) in unicast mode. Its some screwed up stuff… check it out: Using NLB

Again, sorry to be a weenie about the small details. I did think it was a great article.

By: Bobs

Bobs — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 22:29:55 +0000

I definitely like your example of the four people.

Like you said, one shouts it to the other, yet the other 2 hear what you said. Thats also a perfect example of its insecurity. Its not just that the message went to everybody, but what if it was a private message?

In a hub network, it is the receiving computer that says - “nope, thats not for me” since it does go through all the ports. There is plenty of “Snort” tools and hacker tools out there that logs every instance of this and give the details about what was in the data that attempted to go to the other computer. It really is scary what you can open yourself up to just by having a hub! If you do have a hub, make sure you don’t have it patched into any kind of public access port!