D
Fast Ethernet Technology
Introduction
The increased performance and capacity of personal computers along
with the availability of cost-effective, high-resolution peripherals
have fueled the development of high-performance, data-intensive
applications such as graphical user interfaces, computer-aided
engineering, computer-aided training, groupware, image processing,
document management, network resource libraries, and multi-media.
The effective utilization of these new, high-performance systems at
the desktop demands new low-cost, high-performance LAN interface
technologies. The computer LAN industry has responded with several
new technologies to address price, bandwidth, and availability. These
include:
•
FDDI (shared and switched, with/without full duplex)
•
Fast Ethernet (100BaseTX/FX/T4–shared and switched access,
with/without full duplex)
•
ATM
•
100VG-AnyLan
Of all of these technologies, Fast Ethernet (100BaseT), is a technology
that can be integrated into current 10BaseT LANs and allow them to
scale easily to 100 Mb/s. Fast Ethernet provides higher bandwidth
without a major change in infrastructure and will be supported on
every major platform, delivering an excellent business solution to the
increasing requirements for bandwidth on the LAN.
D–1
