Q & A on Reasons for Limits on Length of an Ethernet Segment Q: Why are there limitations on * the length of an Ethernet segment A: The idea of packet switching is to achieve fair use of a shared medium by only permitting a given station to transmit a small amount of data before giving other stations a chance. Q: * number of segments in the network A: In a shared medium system, there can only be 1 packet ``in flight'' at a give time. Parallel hardware (e.g., an Ethernet switch with buffers can handle more). Q: * distance between computers A: The media access protocol contains specific timing parameters that ensure all computers can detect carrier on the medium. A distance restriction arises from the choice of times in the protocol. Q: * number of repeaters Same reason as distance -- each repeater introduces a slight delay.