Upgrading your Network

Considerations for upgrading network capability - Speed, more computers, security.

Speed, if your computer is under five years old it and it has a network card or embedded network capability the chances are it is 100 MBPS. If you know that your card is a 10 MBPS card then it is time to upgrade. Upgrading to the Gigabit (1000 MBPS) card with out having a gigabit network is a waste of your money unless you are upgrading all of your network.

A word here about Cable and DSL modems and internet access: the maximum speed currently offered for cable or DSL users is 5 MegaBit. This is not MEGA BYTE. 5 megabit, divide your current speed by 8, this will give you the current speed you can transfer data to and from your ISP. I have 3 MegaBit DSL, I can only transfer at 384 KiloBytes per second. I think the reason the cable and phone companies advertise their connection speed at MegaBit speeds is to fool us. Wow 3 meg!! or 5 meg!! In reality it is KiloBytes.

If you have a network in your home or small business with more than three computers you should consider the network cards installed. Are they 10 or 100 MBPS. Do you transfer documents back and forth between the computers? Is it slow? If it is you may want to consider the overall network speed. If all the computers have 100 MBPS network cards it isn't the network cards it may be the hub or the length of the cabling from the computer to the hub or the hub or hardware configurations. If your hub is fairly new and has 100 MBS Full Duplex (it transmits and receives at the same time) and is set for 100/full then you may be having cabling problems. It is beyond the scope of this document to trouble shoot network hardware and cabling problems. If on the other hand you have a very old network and mix of network cards (10, 100, 1000 MBPS) and an old hub then you should upgrade to the hub and cards to the same speed.

Adding more computers to a network will increase the demand on the network components. You may want to add a hub in between your current hub and the furthest computer, you may also want to consider a powered hub not a little non powered workstation hub. A powered hub will boost the signal which will degrade after a certain distance from the first hub. Network topology is beyond the scope of this document.

Gigabit cards - this is the latest and greatest from the makers of network products. These cards have backward capability to 10 MBS. If you are buying new you may want to consider the Gigabit if cost is not an determining factor, later on the cost will go down and you can upgrade all the computers and your hub(s) to gigabit.

Security - In this day and age security is on everyone's mind. How do you secure your network from hackers/thieves/criminals? One way is to put a firewall between your network and them. Another is to have a server that requires a user ID and password to access the network and the computers.

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Upgrading your Network

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Considerations for upgrading network capability - Speed, more computers, security.