Half Duplex Ethernet Mode
Ethernet IEEE 802.3 standard defines the half duplex; Cisco describes, it uses a digital signal on a wire pair flowing in both tracks on the wire. Half Duplex always employs the Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Domain (CSMA/CD), so that it can retransmit the transmission if collision occurs. Hub always works in half duplex mode. Half duplex Ethernet is not efficient because it has the limit up to 10BaseT, as Cisco describes 10BaseT is not more than 3 to 4Mbps.
Full Duplex Ethernet Mode
On the other hand, full duplex Ethernet employs two pairs of wires. Full duplex always works with the point to point connection between the transmitter of source node and the receiver of destination node. So, full duplex provides the fast data transmission, if we compare to half duplex. Collisions do not occur in the full duplex Ethernet mode because source always sent data on different wires than the received data wires. Full duplex Ethernet mode is 100% efficient for both tracks (receivers & transmitters). Full duplex offers the connection speed 10 to 100Mbps. In short, we can run full duplex Ethernet mode with any device except a hub. Full duplex Ethernet mode uses an “auto detect mechanism”. As a full duplex Ethernet port is turned on it connects to the remote node then connects to the other nodes of the Ethernet link. The auto detect mechanism determines the transmission exchange rate, means either it can run at 10Mpbs or 100Mbps. And it also determines that what it have to run full duplex mode or half duplex mode.
So the bandwidth and rate of transmission of data is higher in full duplex , from the above comparion given.
source: http://www.learn44.com/what-is-half-duplex-and-full-duplex-ethernet-modes/
