Unlike broadcast transmission which is used on some local area networks , multicast clients receive a stream of packets only if they have previously elect to do so by joining the specific multicast group address.
Membership of a group is dynamic and controlled by the receivers in turn informed by the local client applications. The routers in a multicast network learn which sub-networks have active clients for each multicast group and attempt to minimise the transmission of packets across parts of the network for which there are no active clients.
The multicast mode is useful if a group of clients require a common set of data at the same time, or when the clients are able to receive and store cache common data until needed. The majority of installed LANs e. Ethernet are able to support the multicast transmission mode.
The earliest LAN network interface cards had no specific support for multicast and introduced a big performance penalty by forcing the adaptor to receive all packets promiscuous mode and perform software filtering to remove all unwanted packets. Most modern network interface cards implement a set of multicast filters, relieving the host of the burden of performing excessive software filtering. Furthermore, the functionality is the main difference between broadcast and multicast.
In broadcasting, the packets are transmitted to all the connected devices in the network. However, in multicasting, the packets are transmitted to some of the devices in the network.
Moreover, there is no need for group management in broadcasting. On the other hand, multicasting requires group management as it is necessary to specify the hosts that should receive the packets. Hence, this is another difference between broadcast and multicast.
One other difference between broadcast and multicast is that multicasting is more secure than broadcasting. Besides, the speed is also a major difference between broadcast and multicast.
Broadcasting is slower while multicasting is faster. I have discussed some more differences between broadcast and multicast in the comparison chart shown below. Basis for Comparison Broadcast Multicast Basic The packet is transmitted to all the hosts connected to the network.
The packet is transmitted only to intended recipients in the network. Transmission One-to-all. Management Broadcasting does not require any group management. Bandwidth Bandwidth is wasted. Bandwidth is utilized efficiently. Traffic Unnecessarily huge amount traffic is generated in the network. Traffic is under control. Process Slow. Broadcast is a transmission technology which allows all host connected to a network, to share the same communication channel.
In broadcast, a packet sent by a host is received by all the other host in the network. When a host broadcast a packet, it specifies the address of intended recipient in the address field of the packet. Now as the packet is broadcasted it is received by all the other hosts in the network.
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