Your team is tasked with diagnosing intermittent network traffic issues on a high-speed corporate network. You decide to use a network tap to monitor traffic between two critical switches. When installing the tap, what is crucial to ensure effective monitoring and minimal impact on network performance?
Implement an additional hub between the switches
Use a passive tap
Use an active tap
Deploy an extra switch dedicated to monitoring the traffic
Choosing a passive tap is important because it copies traffic without inserting any active electronics into the data path. Passive taps require no external power, introduce virtually zero latency, and will continue to pass production traffic even if the monitoring device or the tap itself loses power. Active taps, by contrast, must be powered to regenerate or multiplex the signal; a loss of power can create a point of failure and even low-latency active taps still add measurable delay. Placing an additional hub or switch in line would introduce active components that can drop, filter, or alter frames and may oversubscribe bandwidth, so these options are not recommended for unbiased, high-speed monitoring.
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What is a passive tap and how does it work?
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What are the potential drawbacks of using an active tap?
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Why should switches and hubs be avoided for monitoring traffic?