I'm going to be setting up a small 100Mb home network soon and I'd like some info/help. While I know plenty about Unix/Linux sysadmin, I know next to nothing about networking. At first my network will consist of two hosts, with a third host present intermittently (a laptop that floats with me). I don't forsee ever needing more than 5 hosts connected to my home LAN.
I gather I need a HUB or a switch for anything more than two hosts? Which one? I believe I understand the difference. A hub acts as a simple amplifier. Any signal it receives on one of it's ports is amplified and sent to all it's other ports. A switch, if my understanding is correct, adds some smarts to the process and only sends the signals to relevant ports. So if machine A sends a packet to machine B that packet is only sent to the port that machine B is connected to. Is there any advantage to a switch in a small home network? Money, at this level, really isn't the issue, but I don't want to spend extra money on a switch if it's overkill for a small network and doesn't really buy me anything. Thanks, Gary
