I've heard that repeaters don't amplify a signal, but that they recreate it. Are they only used on Ethernet networks and deal only with Ethernet frames? Does recreate the signal mean they repeat the 0's and 1's and have no idea about actual frames?
I've also read that you can connect two Ethernet network segments to repeaters, especially in the older technologies (10base2, 10base5?). And that when one segment has a break and gets reflection and brings down this segment that it doesn't affect the other segment. How does this happen? It would seem like it would simply repeat the reflections/ collisions to the other segment and bring down the other segment, it would seem to have some sort of intelligence, even though it is sometimes referred as a dumb device.