Computer Hardware Terms, Glossary and Dictionary

Cut-through switch is a packet switch wherein the switch starts forwarding that frame (or packet) before the whole frame has been received, normally as soon as the destination address is processed. A cut-through switch can achieve the lowest forwarding delays, but it propagates errors from one LAN to another, because errors can only be detected at the end of each frame. In other words, this technique reduces latency through the switch, but decreases reliability.

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cut-through switch