Apparatus and method for selectively supplying data packets between media domains in a network repeater

Abstract

A repeater provides an efficient interconnection of an IEEE 802.3 10 Mb/s network with an IEEE 802.3 100 Mb/s network using minimal buffering. The repeater includes a filter that selectively outputs a data packet, received from the 100 Mb/s network, to the 10 Mb/s network based on the destination address in the received data packet. Specifically, the filter passes all data packets in the 10 Mb/s domain to the 100 Mb/s domain. The filter selectively passes the data packet from the 100 Mb/s domain to the 10 Mb/s domain by determining if the received data packet includes a destination address value that specifies transmission of the data packet to the 10 Mb/s network. If the destination address value does not specify a multicast value or an address of a network node in the 10 Mb/s network, the filter discards the data packet.

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