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I need a network with two unmanaged switches.

Each switch will have two, 100BaseT devices attached. 100Base devices on one switch communicate with devices connected to the other switch.

If I use GigB switches instead of lower cost,fast 100Base switches, will I get faster transfer speeds? In other words, will the link between the two switches be at Gigabit speeds even though there are no gigabit devices attached to either switch?

Specifically, I'm wondering about the typical case when the two 100 Mbit devices on one switch are simultaneously transferring large files to the 100 Mbit devices on the other switch. Will the link between the two switches be at 1 gigabit speeds?

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Correct. Each individual device will only recieve/transmit at 100Mb, but traffic between the two switches can utilize the full gigabit speed.

This would only apply if multiple devices were transmitting simultaneously across the link between the switches, however. In practice, I doubt you would notice much of a difference unless your devices are transmitting near capacity on a regular basis.

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  • 90% of the time, two devices on one switch will simulatanously transfer 100K byte jpeg files simultaneously to associated devices on the other switches (two cameras triggered by the same event). Delay from event to display of the images on the devices connected to remotely located switch is a key metric. Nov 10, 2014 at 23:51

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