UDP is better suited for transferring large files when compared to TCP ? True ? False
The correct answer and explanation is:
Answer: False
Explanation:
UDP (User Datagram Protocol) is not generally better suited for transferring large files compared to TCP (Transmission Control Protocol). Here’s why:
- Reliability:
TCP is a connection-oriented protocol, meaning it establishes a connection before data transfer and ensures all data packets arrive at the destination in the correct order without errors. It uses acknowledgments, retransmissions, and sequence numbers to guarantee reliable delivery. This is critical for large file transfers, where missing or corrupted data would make the file unusable. UDP, on the other hand, is connectionless and does not guarantee delivery, order, or error-checking. Packets may be lost, duplicated, or arrive out of order. For transferring large files, this unreliability can lead to incomplete or corrupted files. - Flow Control and Congestion Control:
TCP dynamically adjusts its transmission rate based on network conditions to avoid congestion and packet loss. This flow control ensures the network is not overwhelmed, improving overall stability and throughput for large data transfers. UDP does not have built-in flow control or congestion control mechanisms. It sends packets as fast as the application or network stack allows, which can cause packet loss and reduce transfer quality, especially over congested networks. - Use Cases of UDP:
UDP is typically used for applications where speed and low latency are more important than reliability—such as live streaming, online gaming, or voice/video calls—where losing some data packets is preferable to waiting for retransmissions. - Large File Transfer Protocols:
Protocols designed for large file transfers (like FTP, HTTP, or SFTP) are built on top of TCP because its reliability ensures the integrity of large files. There are specialized protocols and methods to optimize large file transfers over TCP, including parallel streams and error recovery.
Summary:
While UDP has less overhead and lower latency, it is not better suited for large file transfers because it lacks reliability, order guarantee, and congestion control. TCP’s reliability features make it the preferred protocol for transferring large files securely and accurately. Thus, the statement that UDP is better suited than TCP for large file transfer is False.