A INDUSTRIAL TRAINING REPORT On

(NETWORK SUPPORT IN AN ORGANIZATION)

Completed At

IT SUPPORT DEPARTMENT

AKC DATA SYSTEMS INDIA, PVT.LTD.

Submitted By Rajan Sharma Enroll No. A1000811003 M. Sc.-Network management and Technology Final Year

Amity Institute of Information Technology Amity University, Noida (Uttar Pradesh) April 2013

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The special thank goes to my helpful Industry Guide, Mr.J S Sodhi. The supervision and support that he gave truly help the progression and smoothness of the internship program. The cooperation is much indeed appreciated. My grateful thanks also go to Mr. AlokVashishtha. A big contribution and hard worked from you during the eight week is very great indeed. All projects during the program would be nothing without the enthusiasm and imagination from you. Besides, this internship program makes me realized the value of working together as a team and as a new experience in working environment, which challenges us every minute. Not forget, great appreciation go to the rest of AKC Data Systems IT Support Staff that helped me from time to time during the project. The whole program really brought us together to appreciate the true value of friendship and respect for each other. Last but not least I would like to thank my friends especially those who work together as interns at AKC Data Systems MrVibhor Jain, Sanjeet Kumar Singh and Abhaykumar Singh for giving me the wise ideas throughout the project. Special thanks also to Mr. SonalSinha, my HR at AKC Data Systems who encouraged, supported and helped me in completing this program successfully.

April, 2013

Rajan Sharma Enroll. No. A1000811003

STUDENT CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that Rajan Sharma, Son/daughter of Suman Prasad Sharma,is a bonafide student of Amity Institute of Information Technology. At present he/she is studying in 4th semester of Masters in Science-Network Technology and Management. This student is recommended for project work in Amity University from Feb 2013 to April 2013 under title Providing Network Support to a Full Fledged Organization and under the guidance of Purushottam Sharma The project is free from any sort of plagiarism and submitted as original work.

Signature Contact Details: Phone number: +91-9716645335 E-mail ID: rajan2251@gmail.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS Topic PAGE

1. Company Profile ........................................................................................................................................................ 7 2. Objective of the Project ............................................................................................................................................. 8 3. Why Network? ........................................................................................................................................................... 9 4. List of Figures 4.1. An Enterprise Network ................................................................................................................................... 19 4.2. Segmentation of LAN ..................................................................................................................................... 22 4.3. A Hierarchical Network Design ..................................................................................................................... 24 4.4. A converged Network ..................................................................................................................................... 26 4.5. UTP (Unshielded Twisted Pair) ..................................................................................................................... 28 4.6. STP (Shielded Twisted Pair) ........................................................................................................................... 28 4.7. Fiber Optic ..................................................................................................................................................... 29 4.8. A 32 port Switch ............................................................................................................................................ 30 4.9. An 1800 Series Router .................................................................................................................................... 31 4.10. Internal Model (PCMCIA, left) and an External Modem (Right) ................................................................. 34 4.11. An NIC .......................................................................................................................................................... 34

CHAPTERS 5. Designing a Network ............................................................................................................................................... 10 6. Network Design Methodology................................................................................................................................. 12 6.1. Identify the Network Requirements ................................................................................................................. 12 6.1.1. Business Goals ................................................................................................................................... 13 6.1.2. Technical Goals ................................................................................................................................... 15 6.1.3. Tradeoffs in Network Design ............................................................................................................. 16 6.2. Characterize the existing Network ................................................................................................................... 17 6.3. Design the Network Topology and Solutions .................................................................................................. 18 7. Hierarchical Network Design ................................................................................................................................. 20

7.1. Simplified Network Design ............................................................................................................................ 20 7.2. Scalability ...................................................................................................................................................... 20 7.3. Separation Function ....................................................................................................................................... 20 7.4. Standard Network Design .............................................................................................................................. 21 8. Logical Segmentation of Network ......................................................................................................................... 22 8.1. Core Layer ...................................................................................................................................................... 22 8.2. Distribution Layer ........................................................................................................................................... 22 8.3. Access Layer ................................................................................................................................................... 23 9. Parameters for Good Network Design .................................................................................................................... 24 9.1 Network Diameter .......................................................................................................................................... 24 9.2. Bandwidth Aggregation ................................................................................................................................. 25 9.3. Redundancy ................................................................................................................................................... 25 10. Converged Network ............................................................................................................................................. 26 11. Physical Network Design ..................................................................................................................................... 27 11.1. Cabling Topology ....................................................................................................................................... 27 11.2. Type of Cable ............................................................................................................................................. 27 11.2.1. Unshielded Twisted Pair ................................................................................................................ 27 11.2.2. Shielded Twisted Pair .................................................................................................................... 28 11.2.3. Fiber Optics ................................................................................................................................... 29 12. Network Components ........................................................................................................................................ 30 12.1. Switches ..................................................................................................................................................... 30 12.2. Routers .............................................................................................................................................................. 31 12.2.1. Console Port ................................................................................................................................................ 32 12.2.2. Auxiliary Port .................................................................................................................................. 32 12.2.3. Serial Port ........................................................................................................................................ 32 12.2.4. Fast Ethernet Port............................................................................................................................. 32 12.2.5. Distance Vector Protocol ................................................................................................................. 32 12.2.6. Link State Protocol ......................................................................................................................................... 33

12.3. Modem ................................................................................................................................................................ 33 12.3.1. Distance Vector Protocol ................................................................................................................................ 33 12.3.2. Link State Protocol ......................................................................................................................................... 33 12.4. NIC ..................................................................................................................................................................... 34 12.5. Firewall ........................................................................................................................................................ 35

COMPANY PROFILE

AKC Data Systems (India) Pvt. Ltd. An ISO 27001 certified company has a team of experienced and energetic software professionals and hardware engineers, who are driven by a passion for excellence in software development, and work diligently to achieve the Companys goal of being to cater to the entire gamut of the computing needs of varied customers. What differentiates AKC data systems from other companies is its continuous effort in developing high quality Educational software for Universities and Schools with large student base. AKC data systems have an enterprise wide approach to quality and a deep commitment to continuous process improvement.

OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT

To understand the working principle of an IT Organization. To Study the good designing principle and techniques to design a network. To understand the important of IT infrastructure in any Organization. To study the process followed in case of any IT infrastructure related failure at end user Terminal To study the monitoring and management techniques used to keep the network available maximum uptime To study the common failures and techniques to counter it.

WHY NETWORK? In modern scenario a Network is often considered as a life support for any business enterprise. In present situation there is a lot of competition in market. Everybody is running trying to make as many customers as possible. The responsiveness to the demands of customers is a very important factor in growth of any organization. The network is considered an important resource for an organization because it helps keep business alive in the market. Take an example of the network of the railways, airways and roadways. If all of them fail the means to connect between cities will be so severely hit that no two remote locations of an organization will remain connected. In 21stwhere many organizations are surviving because of globalization of the world, isolation will affect the business so badly that it will go bankrupt, if this link between cities, countries fails. Howsoever the above explained example is just a hypothetical situation, but it best describes the need of the network. Similarly, a network is developed to exchange the information among various end devices. This information can be very critical for an organization and hence cannot be compromised with. Thus growth of the organization depends upon the underlining IT infrastructure.Also today businesses are saving a lot of cost because of the networks; deployment of video conferencing is one such example. The network also increases the productivity of the organization. Thus it is a must for an organization to have IT infrastructure.

5. DESIGNING A NETWORK In todays scenario, downtime of even a minute means loss of money and reputation. This means that uptime is expected to be 100 %. In order to achieve 100% availability, the network should be fault tolerant. A good network design does not happen coincidently. It requires hardworking of planners and designers, who identify network requirements and then offer a best possible solution to the business. Be it small or large enterprise businesses the basic foundation is Computer Networks. The network provides access to the resources that keep business continuous by keeping people, application and other services connected. To offer this the network is becoming more and more complex. There are a few steps that are involved in designing a good network: 1. Identifying the business goals and technical requirements. 2. Determining the functions and features required to meet the requirements. 3. Creating a design and site test plan. 4. Create a project plan. Once the network requirements are identified the next step is determining what all functions and features the network are expected. Next is creating a design and network is a good network Designing a network is just like designing software except the fact that network design deals with both the physical architecture and the applications to support it. A good network design can be achieved by following a good designing approach. Before designing any network for an organization we must focus on the following aspect. 1. Business requirements, goals and constraints. 2. Technical Considerations and Trade-offs. 3. Future Modifications. 4. The Traffic flow in existing infrastructure. 5. Evaluation of security at different-different levels.

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NETWORK REQUIREMENTS: 1. Maximum Uptime, even in case of link failures, equipment failures and high utilization conditions. 2. It should be deliver a good performance. 3. It should be secure i.e. protect the data from being stolen, damaged and other losses. 4. The network should be easy to modify, scale according to the changing business needs. 5. In case of frequent failures, the network should be easy to troubleshoot. Identifying and fixing a problem should be easy and not time consuming.

6. NETWORK DESIGN METHODOLOGY: Before you actually begin designing a network you should follow a good designing approach. The one which starts from very basic and gradually goes up. The approach that we use with the network is top to bottom. Because the core layer devices are very important, as we move down the hierarchy we scale our network for the end users and we can also distribute the traffic based on certain parameters viz security, type of users, etc. There are a few steps involved in the network designing which are as follows: 1. Identify the network requirements. 2. Characterize the existing network. 3. Design the network topology and solutions.

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6.1. IDENTIFYING THE NETWORK REQUIREMENTS: The designer need to work closely with the customers who will use the network to understand the requirements of the network. The goals of the project will be then documented for use by the technical team. This is done with the help of interviewing the IT Managers, business owners, by asking them a set of question in form of questioners. Goals can be separated into two categories: 6.1.1. Business goals: Focuses on the businesses perspective that how will it make business more successful. It is a deep understanding of customers business needs and policies of the organization and then proposing a best possible solution. Some common business goals are: a. Increasing revenue and profit. b. Improving corporate communications. c. Shorted product development time and increasing productivity. d. Building new customers. e. Implementing an industry standard for better management. f. Cutting the costs of operating. g. Offering new services and features. Understanding Business Constraints: a. Policies and Politics. The policies of the organization must be understood properly by the network designer. So, that he can understand the hidden agendas, relation with the partners for a better design. Not all organization is adaptive to changes. Howsoever change is a natural phenomenon. Understanding these all issues will help network designer deal in a good manner with the customer.

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b. Budget and Staffing. Every organization has a pre decided budget for its IT infrastructure. The design should be such that it best fits the budget of the customer. Allocation of budget includes purchasing of equipments, software licenses, maintenance and support. So, the design should include a balanced distribution of money all over the equipments, licenses, support, etc. Whenever a new network or even software is implemented by any organization, the major concern is staffing of employees. The employees must be trained in a manner such that they can utilize every ounce of the performance. c. Scheduling Scheduling is a very important stage in the lifecycle of any network. Scheduling the implementation of design is done by breaking the whole project into some phases. These are further classified into Milestones. There should be special emphasis on achieving the

milestones otherwise the deadline will never be met and hence the cost on the project will go up.

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6.1.2. Technical goals: Better analysis of Technical goals of the customer will help you choose the technology that will perform up to the customers expectations. Technical goals include the following: a. Scalability Scalability defines the capability of a network to expand in future. The more the network will be scalable the more it will be adaptive to changes. The scope of changes will help add more features and more functionality to the network in future. Howsoever there are few constraints on the scalability, for e.g.: when selecting a flat network topology with layer 2 switches can cause numerous broadcast frames. b. Availability Availability means the availability or the uptime of the network. In other words availability is the measure of the amount of time a network is available to its users. Availability of a network can be measure in terms of percent uptime per year, month, week or even days. To ensure availability of the network we use redundancy. Redundant links, devices increases the fault tolerance of a network and hence ensures maximum uptime. One important aspect of a network is reliability. Maximum availability also means that network is very reliable. It is often associated with resiliency, which is nothing but a measure of how much stress a network can handle and how quickly it comes out of any problem. Network availability can be specified in terms of 9s, viz. 99.60(two 9s), 99.97 (three 9s) which means a network is 4 minutes down per week. The uptime is directly proportional to the cost. c. Performance Performance is a very important parameter. When any customer spends money on any new solution he expects an extraordinary performance. The performance of the existing system is then used by IT managers to justify the amount of money spend. Performance is measured in terms of Bandwidth, Accuracy, efficiency, delay, response time, throughput, goodput,etc.

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d. Security In todays scenario just getting the work out of a network is not sufficient. As the sophistication of the network grew, hackers also developed new methods to intrude into the system. Thus the need to secure the enterprise network also grew. While developing any network a detailed risk analysis is need so that methods to counter the risks can be developed. Strict security policies are then decided by the security analysts and organizations managerial level decision makes to ensure a full proof security. Organizations remote offices connected through VPNs are also not very secure. There is always a threat that a attacker can sniff the packets using the protocol analyzers. e. Manageability Its major purpose is to make the job of manager easy. Some customers have plans to make management of the network easier by following SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol). The widely accepted industry standard to make the network easier to manage is by implementing ISO standard.The termed is coined asFCAPS (Fault Management, Configuration Management, Accounting Management, Performance Management, and Security Management) i) Fault Management: It includes the detection, correction and reporting of the problem. It also deals with analyzing the pattern related to faults. ii) Configuration Management: As the name suggests the management of configuration, controlling and checking the status of the devices. Iii)Accounting Management: Accounting Management deals with the allocating the costs to the network users and accounting of network usage.

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iv) Performance Management: Analyzing the traffic on the network, bandwidth utilization and application behaviors to optimize a network. v)Security Management Monitoring of Policies for implementing security, maintaining the authenticity of the network and managing the encryption keys. f. Usability Usability refers to the ease of use. It means the users can easily use the network services and applications. The more the user friendly interface will be, more interactive it will be. Usability can be maximized by deploying user-friendly host configuration protocol viz. DHCP, which is a plug and play configuration protocol. 6.1.3. Tradeoffs in network design: When designing a network solution for a customer the designer must analyze the customers goals for affordability, it helps you understand the priority of the user. For example if customer wants a high availability then the redundancy will be required. Thus adding to the cost of the infrastructure. Also if customer is expecting a high performance requirement, then high cost fabrics and equipment will be required. Similarly if customer has a high priority for some application then this will cause delay to other applications. Making the right choices and taking the decision on right tradeoffs will help achieve technical goals of the organization.

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6.2 CHARACTERIZE THE EXISTING NETWORK: An important step in designing a new infrastructure is by closely analyzing and examining the existing network infrastructure. This gives a clear idea of how to meet the expectations for various network scalability, performance and availability. Characterizing the existing network means to develop a model for existing network, identifying the important locations, viz. Server rooms, locating the termination point of ISP, identifying the users on different VLAN segment. Next in this process is characterizing the network addressing and naming schemes. Documenting these will help in making strategies for designing a glitch free network. When drawing a network topology for the organization, include the major locations, devices viz. core layer switches, routers, firewalls, etc. Also investigation any special reason for choosing a specific range of IT address that your customer have. Determining whether he is using a private address of class A, B or C. This will help you understand the number of users that exists on the network. In modern scenarios devices are becoming very intelligent they have many advanced features viz. VLAN (Segmentation of network). Also when dealing with the characterization of existing infrastructure, we should also focus on the characterizing the media. It is very important to understand the cabling design of the existing network. This will not only help you identify the traffic flow of the network but also the length of the cable required and hence will save a lot of cost.

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6.3. DESIGN THE NETWORK TOPOLOGY AND SOLUTIONS. Once the whole analysis part is done the next step that comes in the queue is designing a network topology, if analysis is done properly we are just one step ahead of creating a design that will be approved by the customer. The Network topology is nothing but just creating a layout of the whole network. This help technical team to implement the customer desired design, which satisfies the need of the customers. It must be noticed that the main purpose is to represent the geometry of the whole network and not the actual technical implementation of the network. It is a logical design of the network; this step is the first step in logical design phase of top-down approach of network design methodology. To meet the customers requirements for features viz. scalability, etc. it is important to create a layout of the network before choosing the products or technologies. This helps the technical team understand the size and the scope of the networks. Parameters tobe kept in Network layout are as follows: Virtual LAN: A virtual LAN is nothing but a segment of broadcast domain of a network into logical LAN. This can be thought of as emulation of physical LAN into logical one. The users can be placed on different-2 VLANs on the basis of type of users, departments, blocks, etc. It allows division of a large network into small different-2 subnets. This feature reduces the load on the network and hence is very useful to break the broadcast domains. This means that a switch will not flood all the ports with broadcast packet; instead it will only send the broadcast packets on the ports that are part of that particular VLAN. It is easy to manage a VLAN based network. The network administrator can easily manage the policies on the VLANs Redundant Links: In a network there could be certain department that deals with very critical data and hence the failure of any one of these department can bring a huge loss to the organization. So important links must be redundant.

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Figure 4.1: An Enterprise network

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7. HIERARCHICAL NETWORK DESIGN In every business, be it small or medium sized, that uses digital communication, a well-designed LAN is a critical and very fundamental requirement. In most of the scenarios the hierarchical design is used to ensure an easy to manage and achieve a scalable network design which can be flexibly modified according to business needs in future. Also in a hierarchical network design it is very easy to troubleshoot any problem. This design is sometime referred to as modular design because they follow a layered approach. Modular approach has many advantages and some of the major factors for following it are:7.1 Simplified Network Design:A Network that follows a modular approach has a very simplified and easy to understand design that is very important when the organization has a huge network and that network needs to be modified with the time. The Simplified Network Design also saves a lot of cost that is incurred on the Network Wiring, Human expenses, etc. A simplified Network Design is the one which is easy to manage and can be easily understood by the network engineers. When we divide the network in different-different layers the complexity of the network can be reduced to manageable sub sections, which saves a lot of effort 7.2. Scalability:A hierarchical design can be easily scaled according to the need of the organization and this provides the ability to change the network without much downtime. The Design should be such that the modification at one layer should not affect the other two. 7.3.Separation of Functions:When we separate the network on behalf of the function it becomes easy to implement policies and divide the whole network into different-different broadcast domains. This is very necessary to achieve a secure network Design, because the sophistication of the hacking tools is raising day by day. Thus causing a lot of damage to the organization in terms of business and popularity, if the organizations network is vulnerable.
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7.4.Standardized Network Design:If following a network design which are an industry standard then it becomes easy for the vendors to provide a solution to the organization by using this industry standard as a blueprint for an interoperable solution.

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8. LOGICAL SEGMENTATION OF A LAN Typically any hierarchical network can be broadly classified into three sub layers: Core, Distribution and Access. 8.1. Core Layer Generally a core layer in a hierarchical network is a very high speed network device which is used as a backbone of the organizations network. The core layer provides the interconnectivity between the distribution layer devices. It is placed at a very important position because its failure can affect the whole network and hence a high availability is expected from these high end devices. We place redundant devices to ensure the high availability. In most of the situation it is also connected to the Internet.

Figure 4.2: Segmentation of LAN 8.2. Distribution Layer:The major purpose of a distribution layer is to aggregate the data received from the access layer before forwarding it to the core layer switches. The core switches then forwards this data to the router for sending it to the intended destinations. Generally policies are implemented at the distribution layer switches. It controls the flow of the network traffic by performing routing functions between different VLANs (Virtual LAN) which are defined at the access layer. VLAN segment the traffic into separate subnets.

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8.3. AccessLayer:Access Layer provides an interface to the end devices, also called nodes such as Computers, Laptops, IP phones, etc. The purpose of having an access layer is providing a means of connecting the end devices to communicate through the network.

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9. PARAMETERS FOR A GOOD NETWORK DESIGN Just because the design seem to be hierarchical in nature does not mean that the network is well designed. There are few parameters for a good network design. 9.1.Network Diameter: As it is know the diameter is the distance between farthest end points. In case of a network the term network diameter is used to define the number of the devices that a packet must traverse through to reach its destination. A network with a low network diameter will always be a good because in this network the convergence will be fast and also the latency will be least. In the figure 4.3 when the PC 1 is communicating with PC 6. There could be six interconnected switches between then. Thus making network diameter 6. In a typical network every devices introduces some latency to the packet, due to the fact that it take some time to process the packet. This is nothing but latency. The switches determine the destination MAC address of the frame checks the corresponding entry in the MAC table and if no entry exist this entry will be appended in the table and then forwards the frame out on the appropriate port. The happens in fractions of time. But imagine a network which is not well designed then this time will be significantly important. In other words the network diagram is the number of hops between the source and destination in a hierarchical network.

Figure4.3: A Hierarchical Network Design 24

9.2.Bandwidth Aggregation: Bandwidth aggregation is the ability to aggregate the bandwidth or add up the whole bandwidth into one. In other words it is considering the bandwidth requirement of the whole network. Once the bandwidth requirement of the network is known, links among the various network devices can be aggregated, the switches will treat the whole bandwidth after adding all the individual links bandwidth as one. This phenomenon is known as link aggregation. Link aggregation allows multiple switches to merge the links and achieve a good throughput. One such technology which is Ciscos Propriety is calledEtherChannel. In the above figure 4.3, there are multiple links between the Core Layer switches, this is called Link Aggregation. This adds up the bandwidth of the multiple ports of a switch with another. 9.3.Redundancy: In terms of Networking, redundancy is duplication of links and devices to ensure a high availability. It can be ensured by a number of ways. We can join multiple network connection between devices, or we can make the devices redundant. So that in case of a failure the other device can take place of the primary. If network is not designed properly the redundancy can also create a problem viz. Bandwidth wastage, etc. Nowadays there are lots of protocols to manage the redundant links among multiple devices. Howsoever, ensuring redundancy can be expensive too. So while implementing redundancy in a network, one should carefully examined whether a redundant link or redundant device is need or not. In situation where devices are very high end we should redundant the devices. In the figure 4.3, we can see that there are redundant links among devices. Today network devices are very smart they support many advanced feature that ensures redundancy and manages it. One such feature is WAN failover; this feature allows the devices to automatically switch to another ISP if one ISP is down. It should cautiously be noticed that redundancy only deals with the catastrophic failures of devices and links. Redundancy will not ensure availability of network in case of a power outage or any such disaster.
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10. CONVERGED NETWORK Today technologies are coming together. One such example is convergence of PSTN over Internet. This fusion has provided customers many functionalities and features, but for Network Manager this has increased the complexity of the networks and has also caused some security concerns. In simple words convergence is nothing but bringing voice, video over the data networks.A network requires a good backbone infrastructure to support convergence of voice, video and data over same network. It also requires a proper management of network to keep it work seamlessly. Howsoever it cannot be said that it is a cost effective solution because the initial cost of equipment is high. But one can say that it has a high ROI (Return On Investment).

Figure 4.4. A converged network. In a convergent network, there is one more issue. We need to classify the voice, video and data so that it can be prioritized and Quality of Service can be achieved. Sometime moving to converged network is difficult due to the fact that if the business already has a separate Voice and Data Network, then implementing convergence will be wastage of IT budget of the organization until necessary. But when making a decision one should always notice that with a convergent network there is only one network to manage.The best advantage of having a converged network is that you dont need to equip the employees with expensive video conferencing solutions.
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11.PHYSICAL NETWORK DESIGN Any physical network design starts with cabling infrastructure. So the cabling layout should be designed carefully, keeping in mind availability and scalability and expected lifetime of the design. Before starting the laying of cable. We must first focus on the following parameters: 1. Cabling Topology 2. Type and Length of Cable 3. Location of the closets. An efficient cabling layout will be that which will have least amount of cable used. Because this way we will also be able save the cost on infrastructure and the length will be easily manageable. 11.1. Cabling Topology: The cabling topology can be classified into two broad categories: 1. A centralized Cabling Schemes, in which there is a central location all the of cable terminated at this point. For example: A star Topology, In this type of topology a huge amount of cable is required 2. A distributed Cabling Scheme in which there is no central termination point. All other topology types viz. mesh, tree, bus, ring are examples of distributed cabling. 11.2. Type of Cable: Cables can be classified into three major categories: 1. Unshielded Copper Cables (UTP) 2. Shielded Copper Cables (STP) 3. Fiber-optic Cables 11.2.1. Unshielded Copper Cables: Unshielded Copper Cables sometimes referred to as UTP (Unshielded Twisted Pair) are usually used in most wiring closets. It is least expensive among all other alternative available today. It has a very low transmission capability because it does not have any insulation and due to this cross-talk, noise and other interference is very high. Signal strength reduced with distance. So, it only supports a very less speed.

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There are 5 typed of UTP available in market: 1. Category 1 and 2 are usually not used in data networks because they support very less bandwidth. 2. Category 3 is tested to 16 MHz, often known as Voice-grade cable. Used particularly in 10BaseT and 4-Mbps Token Ring network. 3. Category 4 is tested to support 20 MHz, This is nowadays obsolete. 4. Category 5 is tested at 100 MHZ, thus making it capable to run a 100 Mbps network.

Figure 4.5: UTP (Unshielded Twisted Pair)

11.2.2. Shielded Twisted Pair As we know that UTP is least expensive cable, but it is susceptible to noise, radio, electromagnetic interference. So, there raised the need of a shielded twisted pair cable. Shielded cables can also help to extend the transmission distance. Shielded twisted pair cable is available in three different Configurations: 1. Each pair of wires is shielded with foil. 2. There is a foil that acts as a shield inside the jacket covering all the wires. 3. There is a shield around each individual pair, as well as around the entire group.

Figure 4.6 STP (Shielded Twisted Pair)

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11.2.3 Fiber Optic Cable As the need for high bandwidth grew it became necessary to install optical fiber for highspeed and bandwidth requirements. In optical fibers, there is not affected by cross talks, noise and electromagnetic interference. So it is capable of transmitting the data over a longer distance. It consists of a core, which is surrounded by several layers of glass coating. This coating is glass with less refractive index. In optical fiber signal travels in form of light. As we know that speed travels at a very high speed. In other words nothing can travel faster than speed. So, data is transmitted very fast.

Figure 4.7 Fiber Optic

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12. NETWORK COMPONENTS To enable the features and functionality of the network some network devices are responsible. These devices govern the whole communication process. Without these devices any network will not work according to the users expectation. These components make the network. Each component has a specific role in the network. Some of the devices are listed below: 12.1. Switches: Switch is device which is nothing but just an intelligent hub. It looks like a hub but it behaves in a different manner. It is a very desirable device in today network. When it receives any data packet it broadcast the packet on all the port except from the one it received the packet.

Figure 4.7: A 32 port switch After this it creates an ARP table in its memory and when it receives a packet it matches the ARP address of the packet with the one in its table and forwards the packet onto that address. Typically a switch is a layer 2 device. Howsoever there are switches that can act as a layer 3 device. A switch can be classified into 2 types: 1. Layer 2 Switches. 2. Layer 3 Switches. A layer 2 switch is a device that can understand only the MAC (Media Access Control), but a layer 3 switch can understand the IP address as well. This capability of Layer 3 switch makes it a very useful device. One major difference between a router and a layer 3 switch is that it does not have a WIC (WAN Interface Card) which router has. The major purpose of a layer 3 switch is to communicate between InterVLAN.

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Switches come in 2 versions: Managed and Unmanaged, The managed switch can be managed by connecting a Computer with the switch by using its console port, or auxiliary port. These ports are meant for configuration purpose Whereas Unmanaged Switches also known as fixed configuration switches cannot be configured they work according to the factory settings.

12.2. Routers Routers are the devices that route the data around the network. These are the internetworking device that connects to the ISP. The router performs 2 major tasks: 1. Finds the best path to the destination 2. Forwards the Packet Nowadays router have become very intelligent, they can perform a number of other tasks such as DHCP, Firewall, IDS, HTTP, etc. Thus router is also termed as a very smart device that can flexibility handle a variety of tasks. It manages a table which is often called as routing table, this table is managed by router in its memory, and whenever a packet comes it matches the address of the packet with the entry in its table and finds a best match.

Figure 4.8: An 1800 Series Router This best match is nothing but the most appropriate match in routing table. It forwards the packet on that interface. Similarly other routers on the network perform the same task. In meanwhile router also exchange their table with other routers to make converge the network. The router has a variety of ports located onto it.

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12.2.1. Console Port. Console port is meant for the purpose of configuring the router; this port can be connected to the PC by means of a Roll over cable. This cable is a cisco propriety cable. It has a 24 pin connector at one end and other end it have a RJ 45 Connector. 12.2.2. Auxiliary Port. Also meant for the purpose of configuring but by means of connecting the router to a modem and then configuring the router online. This port can be used when router have already been configured for basic configurations. 12.2.3. Serial port (WAN). These ports are WAN ports; which are connected to the other ports of the routers at ISP level. These ports enable the router to send the data to the remote location and hence are very necessary, without these ports the router will be a box with no advantage. One out of the two connected ports can be set with the clock rate. This clock rate will help synchronize the router. 12.2.4. Fast Ethernet Ports. These ports are just like other Fast Ethernet ports. These ports do have a MAC address and the networks connected to these ports are not WAN ports. 12.2.5. Routing Protocol Routers are configured with the routing protocols that make the decision in the router. Routing protocol defines the behavior of the router when it receives a packet on one of its interface. Every Routing protocol uses some algorithm to take the decision based on the best match. And best match can vary routing protocol to routing protocol. It can be thought as Religions in human beings. All lead to the same goal. No matter what path you follow all say the same thing with different words. Routing protocols can be divided into following 2 types: 12.2.5.1. Distance Vector Protocol. Distance Vector routing protocol, each router is aware about all the routes it knows about to all other routers to which it is directly attached (its neighbors). Since every router is aware about its directly connected routes; so, it is not aware about the whole path that will be followed by the router from the source to the destination. In other words it only knows about the next hop. Hops are the means by which it finds the bestpath, Examples of DVR are: RIP, EIGRP, etc

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12.2.5.2.Link State Protocol. A router which uses a link state protocol differs from a router that uses some Distance Vector Protocol in terms of working. A DVR finds the next hop whereas a LSR protocol builds the entire map of the network and then stores it in its memory. On the network LSR enabled routers send advertisements known as LSA (Link State Advertisement) that contain information about what network they are connected to. This LSA are triggered whenever there is a change in the topology. When the network mapping on each router is complete, the advertisements are stopped and hence do not consume the bandwidth. In this regards it sends more packets than the DVRs. In any Link State Routing Protocol the convergence process is slow because it takes time to build the map of the network by exchanging the routing information. Howsoever it is more successful in terms of delivery of a packet. Some examples or LSR are OSPF, Netware Link Service Protocol. 12.3. Modems: Modem is an abbreviation that stands for modulator and demodulator. The device performs a very basic role it converts the digital signal into analog and analog signal into digital signal for use by computer. As we know the conventional telephonelines works on analog signal being superimposed on a carrier signal. This is further transmitted to a distant place and then carrier signal is removed from the analog signal and it is converted to the digital signal which is then fed to the computer. Modems can be classified into 2 categories 12.3.1 Internal Modem Internal Modem also termed as PCMCIA is located internally on the motherboard. This is a chip which can be plugged into an expansion slot in a system and then system uses it. It is shown in the figure. 12.3.2. External Modem External model is a modem that can be connected to the PC by means of a RJ45 port or USB port. The one which is connected to the RJ45 port is connected on the other end with ADSL port. This makes it more successful. It is more flexible than the internal modem.

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Figure 4.9: Internal Model (PCMCIA, left) and an External Modem (Right)

12.4. Network Information Card Network Interface card is also called as Network Cards; they provide the means by which a computer connects to the network. It comes in many shapes and sized. The form factor may vary.

Figure 4.10: A NIC

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12.5. Firewalls: Today firewall has become an essential part of an enterprise network. A firewall is a unified threat management(UTMs) tool. To control the access of who access the organizations network and what type of traffic goes out. It is a mechanism to control the behavior of the network. These devices are usually placed on the entry points and exit points in a networks. A firewall protects internal networks from public networks; they are also used to control access between specific network segments within the network known as demilitarized zone (DMZ), For example: To secure the accounts department data from the entire network we use this firewall to protect all the access. A firewall can be implemented onto a server as well as on dedicated devices. Today the UTMs are becoming very intelligent they can even place controls on application layer. Earlier it was a layer 3 device that was able to filter the IPs but nowadays it has become a layer 7 device it can control application inside one applications.

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