What is the difference between a managed and unmanaged switch?
Unmanaged Switches
In scenarios where the network traffic is light, all that is required is a way for the data to pass from one device to another. In this case there is no need for prioritizing the packets, as all the traffic will flow unorderedly. An unmanaged switch will fill this need without issues. A switch is not a hub. Hubs were a predecessor to switches and provide a similar but less-capable function.
An unmanaged switch allows Ethernet devices to communicate with one another automatically using auto-negotiation to determine parameters such as the data rate and whether to use half-duplex or full-duplex mode.
