Tcp and udp packets?

ankspon

Can anyone explain in laymans terms what this is please,it shows up on my firewall.I have looked at wiki etc but it's all gobbledygook

kwikbreaks

In very simple terms both are strings of data.

TCP and UDP are protocols which define the format of that data required to constitute a packet and how it should be handled.

speedfreek1000

As kwikbreaks says

When computers talk to each other over a network/internet it is done by sending little packets of information to each other. These packets have to be in a set fromat which both computers can understand.

TCP is used for www and email traffic amongst others

whilst UDP tends to be used for gaming and streaming media videos Tv etc

esuhl

When computers communicate over a network, they need to agree a set of standards (known as a protocol) so that they are, effectively, speaking the same language and not mis-interpreting each other.

TCP (transmission control protocol) is optimised for accuracy. If you're downloading a piece of software, it's not that important whether it takes 35 seconds to download or 37 seconds. It is important that you get a perfect copy of the software otherwise it won't work. So, using TCP, if your PC can't make out what data are being transmitted, it will ask the server to send them again.

UDP (user datagram protocol) is optimised for speed. If you are using VOIP to have a phone conversation over the Internet, it's important that as you speak, the person on the other end hears your voice at (roughly) the same without any breaks. It's not vital that you hear the voice in perfect pitch without any interference. So, using UDP, if your PC can't make out the data that are being transmitted, it's no good asking for the same data to be sent again as that would break the conversation - instead your PC would ignore the dropped data and carry on as best it can.

Hope this helps...

TimothyEBaldwin

Another major difference is TCP provides congestion control, it limits the bandwidth usage to that which is available. Without that a network will quickly become unusable due to congestion collapse.

See Wikipedia for another comparison.