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Between each Ethernet frame, 12 bytes of silence must be "sent". How are those 12 bytes of silence actually sent ?
Is it :
- 12 bytes of "0000 0000" (low voltage on the wire)
- 12 bytes of nothing at all (no voltage on the wire)
If the answer is #2 and the machine does not send anything at all, how does it know it's been 12 bytes ? Is it based on the link-speed?
If that's the case, assuming a gigabit Ethernet link speed with an 8b/10b encoding, how much real-world time would 12 bytes of silence actually be?
pHeoz
Posted 2016-04-22T13:25:49.310
Reputation: 207
2https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpacket_gap – DavidPostill – 2016-04-22T13:35:18.750
I'm pressed for time, so I'm going to ignore the last paragraph, but this comment is meant for the other pieces of your question. I note that you've thought this through well, and are right on all your earlier assumptions (your second proposed answer sounds right to me). Actually, @DavidPostill deserves an upvoted answer for the info that he quickly found, as seen in his comment. That page really addresses your questions well. Until he creates an official answer, look at the page he hyperlinked to find the info. – TOOGAM – 2016-04-22T13:40:50.617
1From the info I the linked page, and the comment there that reducing that gap leads to higher collisions, I'd have to conclude that the intention in that the device is not transmitting at all during that period of time. Since it is meant to assist acceptance of packets in the receiver and is not itself data, it's based strictly on the link speed and does not need to be exactly that length - and the actual length can vary to the receiver depending on routes and network delays. – simpleuser – 2016-04-22T15:57:32.307