Networks Articles

Computers » Networks | By Ajeet Khurana @ Wednesday, 23rd April 2008 @ 10:17 PM

Many people are finding that the way to run their business is through remote infrastructure management. This allows for individuals to run their business or their system even when they are away from it. This is like having a service desk on the line at all times and ensuring that your networks are running properly 24 hours a day. This seems extreme to a lot of people, but when you rely on your network to run your business, it isn't extreme at all. Many businesses spend endless... more...

Computers » Networks | By Kenneth Scott @ Tuesday, 26th February 2008 @ 1:26 AM

When you buy wireless equipment, you want to make sure that everything you buy will work in your house with the computer(s) you already have and over the distances required. Before you spend any money on equipment, consider the following issues. Find out about the construction of your walls. In theory, wireless technology is capable of passing through walls and other obstacles relatively easily. However, in reality, some walls are of a thicker or more solid construction than others and m... more...

Computers » Networks | By Daniel Johansson @ Wednesday, 16th January 2008 @ 10:58 PM

Small to medium enterprises can spend a lot of time and money researching what hardware and software is best suited to their office environment. One popular method is to control all IT capabilities in-house, which involves an aggressive spend and on-board expertise in order to do so. Another solution is to employ an IT support company, which often involves reduced operating costs and less ultimate control over their IT infrastructure. Thus, if considering outsourcing your IT support, there are a... more...

Computers » Networks | By Wolfgang Jaegel @ Wednesday, 16th January 2008 @ 12:54 AM

Over the past decade, organizations of all stripes have experienced phenomenal growth in the data volumes they must manage in order to compete and win in a challenging and dynamic marketplace. Traditionally, organizations employed corporate messaging and business applications in order to foster employee productivity and manage critical corporate information. These had relatively modest information requirements. The arrival of the Internet as a mainstream technology created a revolution i... more...

Computers » Networks | By Amy Nutt @ Friday, 14th December 2007 @ 3:49 AM

Load balancing, by definition, is the process of spreading the amount of work that is conducted by a computer system between a number of different computer systems to increase the speed that the work is completed in. There are several different methods in which load balancing can be accomplished by and the technique can use many different types of computer components, including both hardware and software applications. Load balancing is typically completed using a cluster of computer servers th... more...

Computers » Networks | By Michael Talbert @ Thursday, 8th November 2007 @ 8:51 PM

After all the planning has been done and the network assessed, the conclusions drawn and assumptions made must be tested to assure that they are correct before moving on with the migration. Testing new applications and hardware in a production environment can be potentially disruptive to a business if things don't go as expected. It is therefore essential that the testing and tweaking be done on an isolated network segment. The Virtual Network Test Lab The test lab should mirr... more...

Computers » Networks | By Michael Talbert @ Tuesday, 6th November 2007 @ 7:49 PM

Inventory of Assets: Know what you have to work with by taking a full inventory of all your network hardware including switches, routers, servers, existing PBX's, cabling and end user equipment. Make sure to take note of their processing power and throughput capabilities, as well as any nodes that are not VoIP aware. Also be sure to document router OS versions and WAN connections to the Internet. You may find that some equipment may need to be upgraded, refurbished, or retired. For ... more...

Computers » Networks | By Michael Talbert @ Tuesday, 6th November 2007 @ 7:48 PM

A major shift in telecommunications from circuit to packet switched technology, along with increasing sophistication of the corporate LAN/WAN, is prompting businesses of all sizes to consider merging their voice and data networks. Increased bandwidth availability through gigabit Ethernet and fiber trunk lines allow for telephony to be treated as any other application on the IP network, albeit a very needy one. Whereas the main motivation for individual consumers to make the switch to VoI... more...

Computers » Networks | By Kip Goldhammer @ Monday, 5th November 2007 @ 12:31 AM

Structured wiring is a new, but very important concept in the residential construction industry. In fact just as one does not buy a home without any indoor plumbing or central heating today, pretty soon, no one will buy a home without any structured wiring. With structured writing, it is possible to interconnect PCs and printers around the house so that there is file sharing and the possibility of sending information from one PC to another room or printer. In addition to connectivity bet... more...

Computers » Networks | By Luigi Castagna @ Wednesday, 10th October 2007 @ 12:01 PM

When a single server serves pages for many websites, each with its own domain name then this type of hosting is known as shared hosting. What happens is that some small companies do not want to use their resources to host their website on a dedicated server, as it requires a system administrator and the companies want to save their own time and money. As the companies want to minimize the cost so the shared hosting service provider is mainly responsible for the management of the se... more...

Computers » Networks | By Luigi Castagna @ Tuesday, 10th July 2007 @ 7:07 PM

When a single server serves pages for many websites, each with its own domain name then this type of hosting is known as shared hosting. What happens is that some small companies do not want to use their resources to host their website on a dedicated server, as it requires a system administrator and the companies want to save their own time and money. As the companies want to minimize the cost so the shared hosting service provider is mainly responsible for the management of the se... more...

Computers » Networks | By travis klein @ Thursday, 31st May 2007 @ 1:12 AM

Numbers of people these days have two computers in their homes; one is usually kept in the children's room and another in their personal room. So its important for you to know about home networking and its benefits that you can have from both systems in your home. But for this you should know certain things like how to set up home networking, what all you will need for it etc. In order to make home network set-up easy and useful, you need to install a network friendly OS (operating s... more...

Computers » Networks | By Tom Sample @ Monday, 4th December 2006 @ 2:47 PM

Anyone who has ever played online games knows high speed internet (HSI) is almost a must-have purchase. The reasons for this are many, but the proof is in the playing. When it comes to accuracy, speed and ease of use, it just can't be beat. Whether it's a T-1 line, cable or even DSL, high speed internet makes it easier for players to enjoy their games - especially the fast-paced ones that involve a lot of high end graphics. Why is this? It's simple, high speed int... more...

Computers » Networks | By Chris Bryant @ Tuesday, 18th July 2006 @ 10:56 AM

As a CCNA and/or CCNP candidate, you've got to be able to spot situations where Cisco router features can save your client money and time. For example, if a spoke router is calling a hub router and the toll charges at the spoke site are higher than that of the hub router, having the hub router hang up initially and then call the spoke router back can save the client money (and make you look good!) A popular method of doing this is using PPP callback, but as we all know, it's ... more...

Computers » Networks | By Chris Bryant @ Monday, 17th July 2006 @ 12:57 PM

As a CCNA or CCNP, one thing you've got to get used to is that change is constant. Cisco regularly issues new IOS versions, not to mention the many different kinds of hardware they produce! While it's always nice to have "the latest and the greatest" when it comes to routers, switches, firewalls, etc., we have to be prepared for the fact that not all our clients are going to have that latest and greatest! For instance, there are still quite a few Catalyst 5000 switches ... more...

Computers » Networks | By Chris Bryant @ Friday, 14th July 2006 @ 2:03 PM

When you're studying to pass the Cisco CCNA and CCNP certification exams, you quickly learn that there's always something else to learn. (You'll really pick up on this in your CCIE studies, trust me!) Today we'll take a look at an often-overlooked topic in Frame Relay, the encapsulation type. You don't exactly change this on a daily basis in production networks (not if you want to stay employed, anyway!), but it's an important exam topic that you must be familiar... more...

Computers » Networks | By Chris Bryant @ Friday, 14th July 2006 @ 8:41 AM

BECNs and FECNs aren't just important to know for your Cisco CCNA and CCNP certification exams - they're an important part of detecting congestion on a Frame Relay network and allowing the network to dynamically adjust its transmission rate when congestion is encountered. The Forward Explicit Congestion Notification (FECN, pronounced "feckon") bit is set to zero by default, and will be set to 1 if congestion was experienced by the frame in the direction in which the fram... more...

Computers » Networks | By Chris Bryant @ Wednesday, 12th July 2006 @ 2:07 PM

To earn your Cisco CCNA and CCNP certifications, you've got to master ISDN - and despite what some people say, there's still a lot of ISDN out there that needs to be supported. And when it comes to troubleshooting ISDN, there's a lot to look at. Is the correct ISDN switchtype configured? Are the dialer map statements correct? What about the dialer-group and dialer-list commands? And that's just the start. I always say that all troubleshooting starts at Layer 1, the... more...

Computers » Networks | By Chris Bryant @ Tuesday, 11th July 2006 @ 9:56 AM

To pass the Cisco CCNA and CCNP certification exams, as well as becoming a world-class networker, you've got to know how and when to use floating static routes. And if you're wondering what makes them "float" -- read on! In this example, R1 and R2 are running OSPF over a Frame Relay network, 172.12.123.0 /24. They're also connected by a BRI ISDN link, 172.12.12.0 /24. R1 is advertising a loopback network, 1.1.1.1 /32, via OSPF. We want R2 to have a route to that loo... more...

Computers » Networks | By Chris Bryant @ Monday, 10th July 2006 @ 6:48 PM

You may run into situations where a router in a remote location needs to dial in to a central router, but the toll charges are much higher if the remote router makes the call. This scenario is perfect for PPP Callback, where the callback client places a call to a callback server, authentication takes place, and the server then hangs up on the client! This ensures that the client isn't charged for the call. The server then calls the client back. In the following example, R2 has... more...