200-301 · Question #1487
What is a characteristic of a Layer 2 switch?
The correct answer is C. makes forwarding decisions based on MAC addresses. The question asks for a fundamental characteristic defining the operation of a Layer 2 switch.
Question
What is a characteristic of a Layer 2 switch?
Options
- Aresponsible for sending data in a particular sequence
- Bmaintains stateful transaction information
- Cmakes forwarding decisions based on MAC addresses
- Dfilters based on a transport layer protocol
How the community answered
(41 responses)- A5% (2)
- B2% (1)
- C93% (38)
Why each option
The question asks for a fundamental characteristic defining the operation of a Layer 2 switch.
Layer 2 switches forward frames based on destination MAC addresses without concern for the sequence of higher-layer data, which is typically handled by transport layer protocols like TCP.
Layer 2 switches are stateless devices that forward frames based on MAC addresses and do not maintain stateful transaction information, which is a function of higher-layer devices like firewalls or proxies.
A Layer 2 switch operates at the data link layer of the OSI model, building and using a MAC address table to learn the MAC addresses of connected devices, and then forwarding Ethernet frames to the specific port where the destination MAC address is located, rather than broadcasting them.
Filtering based on transport layer protocols (like TCP or UDP ports) is a function of Layer 3 or Layer 4 switches, firewalls, or routers, not a basic Layer 2 switch which operates only on MAC addresses.
Concept tested: Layer 2 switch functionality (MAC address forwarding)
Source: https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/switches/what-is-a-network-switch.html
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