1. router: it is a hardware device that connects two or more networks and acts as a gateway between networks. It is a dedicated intelligent network device that reads the address in each packet and then decides how to transmit it.
2. Switch: It is a kind of network equipment used for electric (optical) signal forwarding.
Second, the function is different.
1. router: The most important function can be understood as realizing information transfer. This process is called addressing process. Because the router is between different networks, but it is not necessarily the final receiving address of information. So in a router, there is usually a routing table.
2. Switch: The switch has a high-bandwidth internal switching matrix and a backup bus to which all ports are connected. Through the internal switching matrix, data packets can be directly and quickly transmitted to the destination node instead of all nodes, so that network resources will not be wasted, resulting in very high efficiency.
Third, the characteristics are different.
1, router: The core is the backplane, and an efficient backplane helps to improve the performance of the router. Because the traditional * * * shared bus backplane can't meet the needs of routers, a switched backplane with different technologies is adopted.
2. Switch: A switch can transmit data between multiple port pairs at the same time. Each port can be regarded as an independent physical network segment (note: non-IP network segment), and the network devices connected to it enjoy all the bandwidth by themselves and do not compete with other devices.
Baidu encyclopedia-switch
Baidu encyclopedia-router