I'm working my way through CCNA3 and have just done the chapter dealing with LAN design. I've seen several network plans and something confuses me:
If I have 2 switches, each with several hosts and these ports run at 10 Mbps, I can connect the 2 switches together. Ideally, this connection should be higher (say 100 Mbps). Both switches will do the switching asymmetrically. So far, so good ...
I've seen a similar diagram but, rather than having a single high throughput connection between the switches, there were 4 identical 10 Mbps connections. There was no explanation of this and I just wonder what's going on.
If all the ports run at 10 Mbps, is there any way that the four connections between the switches can be connected concurrently to allow a total of 40 Mbps or are the cables laid (with three unconnected) so that one of the others can be connected in the event of a failure? I realise that a problem connecting 2 switches with four cables could be switching loops but I don't know if the switches can be configured to avoid loops and still allow more than one 10 Mbps link to run at the same time.
We've not covered switch configuration yet or STP so I'm not too bothered about an in-depth answer if it's something that we'll cover in the next few weeks.
