Chapter 13

Wired LANs: Ethernet

13.1 Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 Ethernet

Ethernet is most widely used LAN Technology, which is defined under IEEE standards
802.3. The reason behind its wide usability is Ethernet is easy to understand, implement,
maintain and allows low-cost network implementation. Also, Ethernet offers flexibility in
terms of topologies which are allowed. Ethernet operates in two layers of the OSI model,
Physical Layer, and Data Link Layer. For Ethernet, the protocol data unit is Frame since we
mainly deal with DLL. In order to handle collision, the Access control mechanism used in
Ethernet is CSMA/CD.
Manchester Encoding Technique is used in Ethernet.

13.2
  Since we are talking about IEEE 802.3
standard Ethernet therefore, 0 is
expressed by a high-to-low transition, a 1
by the low-to-high transition. In both
Manchester Encoding and Differential
Manchester, Encoding Baud rate is double
of bit rate.
 Baud rate = 2* Bit rate

13.3
  Ethernet LANs consist of network nodes and interconnecting media or link.
The network nodes can be of two types:
Data Terminal Equipment (DTE):- Generally, DTEs are the end devices
that convert the user information into signals or reconvert the received
signals. DTEs devices are: personal computers, workstations, file servers or
print servers also referred to as end stations. These devices are either the
source or the destination of data frames. The data terminal equipment may
be a single piece of equipment or multiple pieces of equipment that are
interconnected and perform all the required functions to allow the user to
communicate. A user can interact to DTE or DTE may be a user.
 Data Communication Equipment (DCE):- DCEs are the intermediate
network devices that receive and forward frames across the network. They
may be either standalone devices such as repeaters, network switches,
routers or maybe communications interface units such as interface cards
and modems. The DCE performs functions such as signal conversion,
coding and may be a part of the DTE or intermediate equipment.

13.4
 Figure 13.1 IEEE standard for LANs

13.5
 Figure 13.2 HDLC frame compared with LLC and MAC frames

13.6
 13-2 STANDARD ETHERNET

The original Ethernet was created in 1976 at Xerox’s

Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). Since then, it has
gone through four generations. We briefly discuss the
Standard (or traditional) Ethernet in this section.

Topics discussed in this section:

MAC Sublayer
Physical Layer

13.7
 Figure 13.3 Ethernet evolution through four generations

13.8
 Figure 13.4 802.3 MAC frame

13.9
  PREAMBLE – Ethernet frame starts with 7-Bytes Preamble. This is
a pattern of alternative 0’s and 1’s which indicates starting of the
frame and allow sender and receiver to establish bit
synchronization. Initially, PRE (Preamble) was introduced to allow
for the loss of a few bits due to signal delays. But today’s high-
speed Ethernet don’t need Preamble to protect the frame bits.
PRE (Preamble) indicates the receiver that frame is coming and
allow the receiver to lock onto the data stream before the actual
frame begins.
 Start of frame delimiter (SFD) – This is a 1-Byte field which is
always set to 10101011. SFD indicates that upcoming bits are
starting of the frame, which is the destination address. Sometimes
SFD is considered the part of PRE, this is the reason Preamble is
described as 8 Bytes in many places. The SFD warns station or
stations that this is the last chance for synchronization.
 Destination Address – This is 6-Byte field which contains the MAC
address of machine for which data is destined.

13.10
  PREAMBLE – Ethernet frame starts with 7-Bytes Preamble. This is a pattern of alternative 0’s
and 1’s which indicates starting of the frame and allow sender and receiver to establish bit
synchronization. Initially, PRE (Preamble) was introduced to allow for the loss of a few bits due to
signal delays. But today’s high-speed Ethernet don’t need Preamble to protect the frame bits.
PRE (Preamble) indicates the receiver that frame is coming and allow the receiver to lock onto the
data stream before the actual frame begins.
 Start of frame delimiter (SFD) – This is a 1-Byte field which is always set to 10101011. SFD
indicates that upcoming bits are starting of the frame, which is the destination address.
Sometimes SFD is considered the part of PRE, this is the reason Preamble is described as 8
Bytes in many places. The SFD warns station or stations that this is the last chance for
synchronization.
 Destination Address – This is 6-Byte field which contains the MAC address of machine for which
data is destined.
 Source Address – This is a 6-Byte field which contains the MAC address of source machine. As
Source Address is always an individual address (Unicast), the least significant bit of first byte is
always 0.
 Length – Length is a 2-Byte field, which indicates the length of entire Ethernet frame. This 16-bit
field can hold the length value between 0 to 65534, but length cannot be larger than 1500
because of some own limitations of Ethernet.
 Data – This is the place where actual data is inserted, also known as Payload. Both IP header
and data will be inserted here if Internet Protocol is used over Ethernet. The maximum data
present may be as long as 1500 Bytes. In case data length is less than minimum length i.e. 46
bytes, then padding 0’s is added to meet the minimum possible length.
 Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) – CRC is 4 Byte field. This field contains a 32-bits hash code
of data, which is generated over the Destination Address, Source Address, Length, and Data field.
If the checksum computed by destination is not the same as sent checksum value, data received
is corrupted.

13.11
  Source Address – This is a 6-Byte field which contains the MAC
address of source machine. As Source Address is always an
individual address (Unicast), the least significant bit of first byte is
always 0.
 Length – Length is a 2-Byte field, which indicates the length of
entire Ethernet frame. This 16-bit field can hold the length value
between 0 to 65534, but length cannot be larger than 1500 because
of some own limitations of Ethernet.
 Data – This is the place where actual data is inserted, also known
as Payload. Both IP header and data will be inserted here if
Internet Protocol is used over Ethernet. The maximum data present
may be as long as 1500 Bytes. In case data length is less than
minimum length i.e. 46 bytes, then padding 0’s is added to meet the
minimum possible length.
 Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) – CRC is 4 Byte field. This field
contains a 32-bits hash code of data, which is generated over the
Destination Address, Source Address, Length, and Data field. If the
checksum computed by destination is not the same as sent
checksum value, data received is corrupted.
13.12
 Figure 13.5 Minimum and maximum lengths

13.13
 Note

Frame length:
Minimum: 64 bytes (512 bits)
Maximum: 1518 bytes (12,144 bits)

13.14
 Figure 13.6 Example of an Ethernet address in hexadecimal notation

13.15
 Figure 13.7 Unicast and multicast addresses

13.16
 Note

The least significant bit of the first byte

defines the type of address.
If the bit is 0, the address is unicast;
otherwise, it is multicast.

13.17
 Note

The broadcast destination address is a

special case of the multicast address in
which all bits are 1s.

13.18
 Example 13.1

Define the type of the following destination addresses:

a. 4A:30:10:21:10:1A b. 47:20:1B:2E:08:EE
c. FF:FF:FF:FF:FF:FF
Solution
To find the type of the address, we need to look at the
second hexadecimal digit from the left. If it is even, the
address is unicast. If it is odd, the address is multicast. If
all digits are F’s, the address is broadcast. Therefore, we
have the following:
a. This is a unicast address because A in binary is 1010.
b. This is a multicast address because 7 in binary is 0111.
c. This is a broadcast address because all digits are F’s.
13.19
 Example 13.2

Show how the address 47:20:1B:2E:08:EE is sent out on

line.

Solution
The address is sent left-to-right, byte by byte; for each
byte, it is sent right-to-left, bit by bit, as shown below:

13.20
 Figure 13.8 Categories of Standard Ethernet

13.21
 Figure 13.9 Encoding in a Standard Ethernet implementation

13.22
 Figure 13.10 10Base5 implementation

13.23
 Figure 13.11 10Base2 implementation

13.24
 Figure 13.12 10Base-T implementation

13.25
 Figure 13.13 10Base-F implementation

13.26
 Table 13.1 Summary of Standard Ethernet implementations

13.27
 13-3 CHANGES IN THE STANDARD

The 10-Mbps Standard Ethernet has gone through

several changes before moving to the higher data
rates. These changes actually opened the road to the
evolution of the Ethernet to become compatible with
other high-data-rate LANs.

Topics discussed in this section:

Bridged Ethernet
Switched Ethernet
Full-Duplex Ethernet

13.28
 Figure 13.14 Sharing bandwidth

13.29
 Figure 13.15 A network with and without a bridge

13.30
 Figure 13.16 Collision domains in an unbridged network and a bridged network

13.31
 Figure 13.17 Switched Ethernet

13.32
 Figure 13.18 Full-duplex switched Ethernet

13.33
 13-4 FAST ETHERNET

Fast Ethernet was designed to compete with LAN

protocols such as FDDI or Fiber Channel. IEEE
created Fast Ethernet under the name 802.3u. Fast
Ethernet is backward-compatible with Standard
Ethernet, but it can transmit data 10 times faster at a
rate of 100 Mbps.

Topics discussed in this section:

MAC Sublayer
Physical Layer

13.34
 Figure 13.19 Fast Ethernet topology

13.35
 Figure 13.20 Fast Ethernet implementations

13.36
 Figure 13.21 Encoding for Fast Ethernet implementation

13.37
 Table 13.2 Summary of Fast Ethernet implementations

13.38
 13-5 GIGABIT ETHERNET

The need for an even higher data rate resulted in the

design of the Gigabit Ethernet protocol (1000 Mbps).
The IEEE committee calls the standard 802.3z.

Topics discussed in this section:

MAC Sublayer
Physical Layer
Ten-Gigabit Ethernet

13.39
 Note

In the full-duplex mode of Gigabit

Ethernet, there is no collision;
the maximum length of the cable is
determined by the signal attenuation
in the cable.

13.40
 Figure 13.22 Topologies of Gigabit Ethernet

13.41
 Figure 13.23 Gigabit Ethernet implementations

13.42
 Figure 13.24 Encoding in Gigabit Ethernet implementations

13.43
 Table 13.3 Summary of Gigabit Ethernet implementations

13.44
 Table 13.4 Summary of Ten-Gigabit Ethernet implementations

13.45
  In Ethernet when Manchester encoding is
used, the bit rate is:
(A) Half the baud rate.
(B) Twice the baud rate.
(C) Same as the baud rate.
(D) None of the above

13.46
 ETHERNET LAN

Ethernet is the second name given

LAN stand for Local Area
1. to thePrevalent Packet
Network.
Switched LAN technology.

While LAN uses the both bus and

Ethernet uses the bus topology and
2. star topology as well as ring
star topology.
topology.

3. Control of Ethernet is decentralized. While control of LAN is centralized.

While in LAN both guided and

In Ethernet guided transmission
4. unguided transmission media are
media is used.
used.

5. Reliability of Ethernet is low. While reliability of LAN is high.

There is limitation take place in While there is no limitation take

6.
transmission of Ethernet. place in transmission of LAN.

13.47
 IEEE 802.11 Mac Frame
 Prerequisite – Basics of Wi-fi
MAC layer provides functionality for several tasks like control medium
access, can also offer support for roaming, authentication, and power
conservation. The basic services provided by MAC are the mandatory
asynchronous data service and an optional time-bounded service.
IEEE 802.11 defines two MAC sub-layers :-
 Distributed Coordination Function (DCF) –
DCF uses CSMA/CD as access method as wireless LAN can’t implement
CSMA/CD. It only offers asynchronous service.
 Point Coordination Function (PCF) –
PCP is implemented on top of DCF and mostly used for time-service
transmission. It uses a centralized, contention-free polling access method.
It offers both asynchronous and time-bounded service.

13.48
 MAC Frame:
The MAC layer frame consist of 9 fields. The following figure shows the basic
structure of an IEEE 802.11 MAC data frame along with the content of the
frame control field.

13.49
  Frame Control(FC) –
It is 2 bytes long field which defines type of frame and some control
information. Various fields present in FC are:Version:
It is a 2 bit long field which indicates the current protocol version which is
fixed to be 0 for now.
 Type:
It is a 2 bit long field which determines the function of frame i.e
management(00), control(01) or data(10). The value 11 is reserved.
 Subtype:
It is a 4 bit long field which indicates sub-type of the frame like 0000 for
association request, 1000 for beacon.
 To DS:
It is a 1 bit long field which when set indicates that destination frame is for
DS(distribution system).
 From DS:
It is a 1 bit long field which when set indicates frame coming from DS.
 More frag (More fragments):
It is 1 bit long field which when set to 1 means frame is followed by other
fragments.
 Retry:
It is 1 bit long field, if the current frame is a retransmission of an earlier
frame, this bit is set to 1.
13.50
  Power Mgmt (Power management):
It is 1 bit long field which indicates the mode of a station after successful
transmission of a frame. Set to 1 the field indicates that the station goes
into power-save mode. If the field is set to 0, the station stays active.
 More data:
It is 1 bit long field which is used to indicates a receiver that a sender has
more data to send than the current frame. This can be used by an access
point to indicate to a station in power-save mode that more packets are
buffered or it can be used by a station to indicate to an access point after
being polled that more polling is necessary as the station has more data
ready to transmit.
 WEP:
It is 1 bit long field which indicates that the standard security mechanism of
802.11 is applied.
 Order:
It is 1 bit long field, if this bit is set to 1 the received frames must be
processed in strict order.
13.51
  Duration/ID –
It is 4 bytes long field which contains the value indicating the period of time
in which the medium is occupied(in µs).
 Address 1 to 4 –
These are 6 bytes long fields which contain standard IEEE 802 MAC
addresses (48 bit each). The meaning of each address depends on the DS
bits in the frame control field.

 SC (Sequence control) –
It is 16 bits long field which consists of 2 sub-fields, i.e., Sequence number
(12 bits) and Fragment number (4 bits). Since acknowledgement
mechanism frames may be duplicated hence, a sequence number is used to
filter duplicate frames.
 Data –
It is a variable length field which contain information specific to individual
frames which is transferred transparently from a sender to the receiver(s).
 CRC (Cyclic redundancy check) –
It is 4 bytes long field which contains a 32 bit CRC error detection sequence
to ensure error free frame.

13.52
 Frame Relay:

Frame Relay is that the transmission mode during which information

is transferred through electric circuit layer, within the style of
packets. It provides the information speed from sixty four Kbps to
forty five Mbps. Frame relay has variable packet size. It doesn’t give
error management and flow management. The responsibility of
frame relay is a smaller amount.

synchronous Transmission Mode (ATM):

ATM has mounted packet size. It provides the information speed of

a hundred and fifty five.5 Mbps or 622 Mbps. ATM provides error
management and flow management. it’s a decent reliable than
frame relay.

13.53
13.54
13.55
 S.NO FAST ETHERNET GIGABIT ETHERNET
Fast Ethernet provides 100 Gigabit Ethernet offers 1
1.
Mbps speed. Gbps speed.
While Gigabit Ethernet is
Fast Ethernet is simple
2. more complicated than Fast
configured.
Ethernet.
Gigabit Ethernet generate
Fast Ethernet generate more
3. less delay than Fast
delay comparatively.
Ethernet.
While the coverage limit of
The coverage limit of Fast
4. Gigabit Ethernet is up to 70
Ethernet is up to 10 km.
km.
The round-trip delay in Fast While the round-trip delay in
5. Ethernet is 100 to 500 bit Gigabit Ethernet is 4000 bit
times. times.
Fast Ethernet is the Successor While Gigabit Ethernet is the
6.
of 10-Base-T Ethernet. successor of Fast Ethernet.
13.56