Question about unmanaged switch

[Withenex]

I recently bought an Nvidia shield pro and I want to stream my steam games to it through the steam link app. The wireless networking isn't as fast as I would like so I'm considering buying a switch and connecting the PC and the shield to the same unmanaged switch. From what I know about networking the network traffic should flow directly between the two devices instead of going through the router. Am I correct?

[Master Disaster]

3 minutes ago, Withenex said:

I recently bought an Nvidia shield pro and I want to stream my steam games to it through the steam link app. The wireless networking isn't as fast as I would like so I'm considering buying a switch and connecting the PC and the shield to the same unmanaged switch. From what I know about networking the network traffic should flow directly between the two devices instead of going through the router. Am I correct?

Actually no.

 

The switch needs to go to the router and to the shield.

[Lurick]

5 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

Actually no.

 

The switch needs to go to the router and to the shield.

Actually OP's understanding is correct. The traffic will be switched locally and won't need to touch the router since it will be on the same subnet. Now if the devices need to get out to the internet they'll need to hit the router.

[Withenex]

5 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

Actually no.

 

The switch needs to go to the router and to the shield.

I get that the traffic first has to be "routed" by the router but I thought that every packet shouldn't have to make a trip to the router 

[Kilrah]

If both are connected to the switch then yes the packets will go directly between them. You do want to connect the switch to the router for internet connectivity / DHCP though.

[minibois]

7 minutes ago, Withenex said:

From what I know about networking the network traffic should flow directly between the two devices instead of going through the router. Am I correct?

Yes, I believe that is the case yes.

This is not something I have intimate understanding off, but in the past I believed the data went from:

Device#1 > Switch#1 > Router > Switch#1 > Device#2, but I am pretty sure with a switch it just goes: Device#1 > Switch#1 > Device#2.

 

This is done with ARP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Address_Resolution_Protocol

 

See this thread for a bit more information and to also see me completely not knowing about this concept: 

 

[tkitch]

3 minutes ago, minibois said:

Yes, I believe that is the case yes.

This is not something I have intimate understanding off, but in the past I believed the data went from:

Device#1 > Switch#1 > Router > Switch#1 > Device#2, but I am pretty sure with a switch it just goes: Device#1 > Switch#1 > Device#2.

 

This is done with ARP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Address_Resolution_Protocol

 

See this thread for a bit more information and to also see me completely not knowing about this concept: 

 

The router doesn't need to be between the Computer and the Shield.

 

But it can't just be:

Shield -> Switch -> Computer

The router does need to be attached to the Switch as well.  Otherwise you'll have a switch not providing IPs or anything else to the ethernet cards, so they won't talk to each other.  (Unless you start setting static IPs and such things.)

[Lurick]

1 minute ago, tkitch said:

The router doesn't need to be between the Computer and the Shield.

 

But it can't just be:

Shield -> Switch -> Computer

The router does need to be attached to the Switch as well.  Otherwise you'll have a switch not providing IPs or anything else to the ethernet cards, so they won't talk to each other.  (Unless you start setting static IPs and such things.)

Incorrect. They'll use APIPA addresses and they can talk still to each other.

[tkitch]

1 minute ago, Lurick said:

Incorrect. They'll use APIPA addresses and they can talk still to each other.

I have NEVER had any luck with devices talking to each other with APIPA.

[Lurick]

Just now, tkitch said:

I have NEVER had any luck with devices talking to each other with APIPA.

I mean it's not the greatest in the world and the work to find both IP addresses so they can talk directly is probably going to take just as much time as setting two static addresses but it can still be done without the need for statics.

[tkitch]

1 minute ago, Lurick said:

I mean it's not the greatest in the world and the work to find both IP addresses so they can talk directly is probably going to take just as much time as setting two static addresses but it can still be done without the need for statics.

OH!  If getting a cable to the router is really that difficult / impractical.  

Set up the computer for ICS over the wired connection.  That'll fix routing issues just fine. 

[Withenex]

1 minute ago, tkitch said:

OH!  If getting a cable to the router is really that difficult / impractical.  

Set up the computer for ICS over the wired connection.  That'll fix routing issues just fine. 

Uh guys, I never said that the switch wouldn't be connected to the router

[Lurick]

Just now, Withenex said:

Uh guys, I never said that the switch wouldn't be connected to the router

I figured/hoped there would be a connection to the router for external communication but your original question about how they will talk is 100% correct (provided both on the same subnet which they will be in this case I presume) Device 1 > Switch > Device 2

[CerealExperimentsLain]

3 hours ago, minibois said:

Yes, I believe that is the case yes.

This is not something I have intimate understanding off, but in the past I believed the data went from:

Device#1 > Switch#1 > Router > Switch#1 > Device#2, but I am pretty sure with a switch it just goes: Device#1 > Switch#1 > Device#2.

 

This is done with ARP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Address_Resolution_Protocol

 

See this thread for a bit more information and to also see me completely not knowing about this concept: 

 

I mean, the router isn't even essential for the process of local traffic other than for DHCP.  I use a pfSense box in my apartment so all switching is done on physically separate unmanaged switches and an access point.  Since most of my hardware, that is not on wifi, is on static IPs, I can power down and even disassemble the pfSense box, but local traffic between my media servers and HTPCs and the likes continues to work fine.  Only the wifi devices, since Windows won't let me configure a static IP on one wifi network but to use DHCP on other wifi networks, are on DHPC and they have problems.

[Alex Atkin UK]

4 hours ago, minibois said:

This is not something I have intimate understanding off, but in the past I believed the data went from:

Device#1 > Switch#1 > Router > Switch#1 > Device#2, but I am pretty sure with a switch it just goes:

Device#1 > Switch#1 > Device#2.

Actually that is incorrect, if it is just local LAN traffic then "technically" the traffic never hits the router in either scenario (other than DHCP to get its IP/DNS assigned in the first place).

 

Routers contain a switch, only traffic directed at the router itself or the Internet will pass from that switch into the router via an internally wired ethernet port, sometimes more than one (so that LAN and WAN traffic isn't sharing a single Gigabit port).

 

Its really quite fascinating as some routers have one ethernet port hooked into the switch and the WAN port is another ethernet port directly connected to the routers SoC, NOT the internal switch.  Other routers have one ethernet port into the switch and the WAN port is just another switch port using VLANs to isolate it from the LAN (this limits the WAN speed as traffic goes across this port twice, once coming in from the WAN and again when its sent to the LAN) and the third type have two ethernet ports into the switch to avoid the previous issue.

 

So basically a router (unless its insanely old) should be considered a router and a switch.