Book Image

Networking Fundamentals

By : Gordon Davies
Book Image

Networking Fundamentals

By: Gordon Davies

Overview of this book

A network is a collection of computers, servers, mobile devices, or other computing devices connected for sharing data. This book will help you become well versed in basic networking concepts and prepare to pass Microsoft's MTA Networking Fundamentals Exam 98-366. Following Microsoft's official syllabus, the book starts by covering network infrastructures to help you differentiate intranets, internets, and extranets, and learn about network topologies. You’ll then get up to date with common network hardware devices such as routers and switches and the media types used to connect them together. As you advance, the book will take you through different protocols and services and the requirements to follow a standardized approach to networking. You’ll get to grips with the OSI and TCP/IP models as well as IPv4 and IPv6. The book also shows you how to recall IP addresses through name resolution. Finally, you’ll be able to practice everything you’ve learned and take the exam confidently with the help of mock tests. By the end of this networking book, you’ll have developed a strong foundation in the essential networking concepts needed to pass Exam 98-366.
Table of Contents (23 chapters)
Free Chapter
1
Section 1: Network Infrastructure
7
Section 2: Network Hardware
11
Section 3: Protocols and Services
18
Section 4: Mock Exams
19
Mock Exam 1
20
Mock Exam 2

Setting up a broadband connection

In the 1990s, when I got my first computer, most ISPs would provide you with a CD that included software that configured your home connection to their service. These usually would configure your dial-up modem, and in some cases also gave you a graphical user interface to navigate the internet. However, the use of CDs has pretty much faded with the demise of modems. Nowadays, our ISP will provide us with some form of preconfigured home router that will connect directly to the ISP, and all you have to do is connect your devices to the router.

While we can usually connect directly to our ISP-provided hub/router, there may be times when we need to manually configure this broadband connection. In the following activity, we will manually set up a broadband connection.

Because in the real world this requires an account with a service provider, we will...