About This Guide; Purpose; Terms/Usage; Introduction - TRENDnet TEG-448WS User Manual

ABOUT THIS GUIDE

Congratulations on your purchase of the TEG-448WS 48-Port Gigabit
Ethernet Web Smart Switch. This device integrates 1000Mbps Gigabit
Ethernet, 100Mbps Fast Ethernet and 10Mbps Ethernet network
capabilities in a highly flexible package.

Purpose

This guide describes how to install your TEG-448WS 48-Port Gigabit
Ethernet Web Smart Switch.

Terms/Usage

In this guide, the term "Switch" (first letter upper case) refers to the
device of TEG-448WS 48-Port Gigabit Ethernet Web Smart Switch
and "switch" (first letter lower case) refers to other Ethernet switches.
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INTRODUCTION

This chapter describes the features of the TEG-448WS 48-Port
Gigabit Ethernet Web Smart Switch and some background
information about Ethernet/Fast Ethernet/Gigabit Ethernet switching
technology.

Gigabit Ethernet Technology

Gigabit Ethernet is an extension of IEEE 802.3 Ethernet utilizing the
same packet structure, format, and support for CSMA/CD protocol,
full duplex, flow control, and management objects, but with a tenfold
increase in theoretical throughput over 100-Mbps Fast Ethernet and a
hundredfold increase over 10-Mbps Ethernet. Since it is compatible
with all 10-Mbps and 100-Mbps Ethernet environments, Gigabit
Ethernet provides a straightforward upgrade without wasting a
company's existing investment in hardware, software, and trained
personnel.
The increased speed and extra bandwidth offered by Gigabit Ethernet
is essential to coping with the network bottlenecks that frequently
develop as computers and their busses get faster and more users use
applications that generate more traffic. Upgrading key components,
such as your backbone and servers to Gigabit Ethernet can greatly
improve network response times as well as significantly speed up the
traffic between your subnets.
Gigabit Ethernet enables fast optical fiber connections to support
video conferencing, complex imaging, and similar data-intensive
applications. Likewise, since data transfers occur 10 times faster than
Fast Ethernet, servers outfitted with Gigabit Ethernet Adapters are
able to perform 10 times the number of operations in the same amount
of time.
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