LAN's & WAN's?

Question

I could do with a bit of help here.

Would anyone mind telling me what the features and services of a LAN (Local Area Network) and a WAN (WIde Area Network) are.

If anyone can help me, they'll have my thanks and of course 10 points.

Answer 1

OK some of the main network types, their features and services;

LAN - Usually covering a small geographic area, like a home, office, or group of buildings.

VLAN Virtual LANs within a LAN.Several VLANs can co-exist within such a LAN. This helps in reducing the broadcast domain and administratively separating logical segments of LAN (like company departments) which should not exchange data using LAN (they still can by routing).

MAN - Metrolpolitan Area Network - Eg City Police department , are large computer networks usually spanning a city. They typically use wireless infrastructure or optical fiber connections to link their sites.

SAN - Storage Area Network
A network whose essential purpose is the transfer of data between computer systems and storage elements. A SAN consists of a communication infrastructure, which provides physical connections, and a management layer, which organizes the connections, storage elements, and computer systems so that data transfer is secure and robust. The term SAN is usually (but not necessarily) identified with block I/O services rather than file access services.

DMZ

Short for demilitarized zone, a computer or small subnetwork that sits between a trusted internal network, such as a corporate private LAN, and an untrusted external network, such as the public Internet.
Typically, the DMZ contains devices accessible to Internet traffic, such as Web (HTTP ) servers, FTP servers, SMTP (e-mail) servers and DNS servers.

The term comes from military use, meaning a buffer area between two enemies.


WAN

A computer network that spans a relatively large geographical area. Typically, a WAN consists of two or more LANs
Computers connected to a wide-area network are often connected through public networks, such as the ADSL/Cable broadband and dialup telephone systems. They can also be connected through leased lines or satellites. The largest WAN in existence is the Internet.

Answer 2

Local Area Network or LAN
A LAN network is the type of network that all small businesses with just one office would use. It covers a small region of space, typically a single building. They typically have a lot higher bandwidth capability than a WAN or a MAN. And they are usually run and maintained by the business.

Wide Area Network or WAN
The third type of network infrastructure, a WAN, uses existing telecommunications circuits to connect intermediate nodes. The existing telecommunications network usually restricts the performance of a WAN.

A WAN is a long distance network: it connects systems together throughout a country, or even to outside the country.

Answer 3

LAN - community area community A LAN connects community units over a incredibly short distance. A networked place of work development, college, or living house generally features a single LAN, nonetheless each and every so often one development will comprise some small LANs (according to threat one according to room), and in specific situations a LAN will span a team of close by homes. In TCP/IP networking, a LAN is generally yet no longer continually carried out as a single IP subnet. besides to working in a constrained area, LANs are additionally generally owned, controlled, and controlled with the help of a single individual or employer. they extremely tend to apply specific connectivity technologies, often Ethernet and Token Ring. WAN - extensive area community by using fact the term implies, a WAN spans a brilliant actual distance. the internet is the biggest WAN, spanning the Earth. A WAN is a geographically-dispersed selection of LANs. A community gadget called a router connects LANs to a WAN. In IP networking, the router keeps the two a LAN address and a WAN address. A WAN differs from a LAN in distinctive substantial approaches. maximum WANs (like the internet) at the instant are not owned with the help of anybody employer yet incredibly exist under collective or disbursed possession and administration. WANs tend to apply technologies like ATM, physique Relay and X.25 for connectivity over the longer distances.

Answer 4

LAN stands for Local Area Network. As the name suggests, it's a network of computers that is in the immediate area. It usually means a network that is physically wired by cables. If it's a wireless network, the term WLAN is used (Wireless Local Area Network).

WAN is Wide Area Network, typically the world wide web (or the internet). It's essentially a network of networks, connecting different networks through telecommunication nodes by way of your local utility provider (ie: BT, etc.) to your network service provider or ISP (ie: Wanadoo, BT Broadband, etc.) and onto other services internationally via various telecommunication networks.

Answer 5

You've already learned what LAN and WAN stand for.

Short answer is that the LAN is for a small area.
WAN is used to connects LANs together across a long distance.

LAN is used for shared communication inside a small physical area. Ethernet over CAT5 wire is the most common LAN technology in use. All Ethernet attached things connect to a central device, common name is an Ethernet switch. You can have multiple PCs share a Internet connection for example. You can get a printer that connects to Ethernet and all the PCs can share this printer without having to have the printer attached to a PC running print sharing. You can put a central data storgage drive on the network for all the computers on the LAN to backup to. I have all of that in my home network. My employer has all of this on steroids.

The WAN is used to connect your LAN to other LANs. There are many many different WAN technologies (Frame Relay, ATM, PPP, ADSL (is actually ATM), etc..)

The Internet, for example, is a collection of LANs connected together by a common WAN. My LAN is connected to the Internet via a cable modem(WAN), my employers multiple LANS are connected together via their own private WAN, which at a particular location connects to the Internet via a T3 (45Mbps).

Answer 6

LAN provides network connectivity for a house, office, campus, university, etc. LAN can be wired or wireless. Most LANs today are Ethernet based and have distance limitations of about 2 miles.

WANs connect LANs to one another and can span thousands of miles in distance. If a business has an office in LA and one in NY they would use a WAN connection such as T1, ATM, Frame Relay, MPLS, ISDN to connect the two together. Also, when you connect to the Internet using DSL, cable, or dial-up, you're using a WAN connection.

Answer 7

LAN = Local Area Network
WAN = Wide Area Network.

LAN is for a home wired network.
WAN is for a wireless and long ranged network.

LAN is usually more secure but you can add more security to WAN to help.

Answer 8

One other piece of information: A LAN is much faster than a WAN. You can do client/server across a LAN, with WAN's typically you need multi-tier architecture (ie - a browser based application for example) to get any speed for real time use.