Which environment uses a switch that maintains a MAC address table and forwards packets to the correct destination?

Which environment uses a switch that maintains a MAC address table and forwards packets to the correct destination?

• A. Switched Ethernet environment
• B. Shared Ethernet environment
• C. Wireless LAN
• D. Ring network

Answer: (A)

A switch that maintains a MAC address table learns where every device is on the network by recording the source MAC address of frames as they arrive on each port. With that knowledge, it forwards each new frame only to the port associated with the destination MAC, rather than broadcasting to every device. This is the defining feature of a switched Ethernet environment: each port becomes its own collision domain and traffic is directed to the exact destination, improving efficiency and reducing unnecessary traffic. In a shared Ethernet environment, there isn’t per-destination forwarding—hubs broadcast frames to all devices on the same segment, which leads to more collisions and wasted bandwidth. In a Wireless LAN, while forwarding still happens through the access point and bridging to the wired network, the specific mechanism described—a switch maintaining a MAC address table to forward to the correct destination—fits switched Ethernet best. Ring networks use a different mechanism altogether, such as token passing, rather than MAC-table-based switching.

A switch that maintains a MAC address table learns where every device is on the network by recording the source MAC address of frames as they arrive on each port. With that knowledge, it forwards each new frame only to the port associated with the destination MAC, rather than broadcasting to every device. This is the defining feature of a switched Ethernet environment: each port becomes its own collision domain and traffic is directed to the exact destination, improving efficiency and reducing unnecessary traffic. In a shared Ethernet environment, there isn’t per-destination forwarding—hubs broadcast frames to all devices on the same segment, which leads to more collisions and wasted bandwidth. In a Wireless LAN, while forwarding still happens through the access point and bridging to the wired network, the specific mechanism described—a switch maintaining a MAC address table to forward to the correct destination—fits switched Ethernet best. Ring networks use a different mechanism altogether, such as token passing, rather than MAC-table-based switching.