Networking. Tips and Secrets of Your Net

Hello.

I write this article especially for IoT challenge. +100500 new weather
stations or wireless controlled switch will be nothing without internet connection

On this article i'll describe all about networks. Mysteries, fakes, myths. All my experience as a man who built ISPs. I'll try in easiest way explain:

1. What is a network

2. What technology of access mean for end-user. What end-user will receive in excellent condition and what in real

3. Cables and wires

4. Switches and routers....

5. Tricks and fakes of your isp's

6. E tc

In some places i'll post faq with real tech answers(not that what you'll receive on call-center). Your question suggestions and remarks i'll add to this article. I'll try simple as i can explain how you can build your home net with different tricks

P.S. All what described in this article i seen in real. You can correct me

P.P.S2. I'll add more info in time. It really hard to move information from head to web

Step 1: What Is Network

Q: What is network

A: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_network

Without tech term it mean all tech and accessorities which help you access to your fb page

Q: tech whis i use to access to my fb

A: get ready for many letters

Telephone line

1.Dial-UP

Speed max 56Kbit/S real 41-46 Kbit/S your fb page will load 5-15 Minutes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dial-up_Internet_access

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modem

tech for "dinosaurs" almost forgotten tech but in avery big city if you'll know mysterios number youll get acess to net. really slow tech

2. DSL:

Old tech from 115Kbit/s till 2 Mbit (VDSL HDSL etc)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_subscriber_line

3. ADSL

This is really normal tech. Most ISP will give you 10-24 MB/s. Ideal for home or small office work

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymmetric_digital_subscriber_line

4. Else (vdsl, hdsl....)

Cable

1. TV cable

1.1 BNC

old tech but still works. There are really hudge ammount of forgotted hosts and nets. And it still work now.

As example: on my facility was inernet access 1MB to averyone. I call to central office and one old geeck come and... and connect our facility to old bnc cale from 197x. This was mirracle 10MB/s ... And this cable still work... Now my facility have fiberoptics access

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BNC_connector

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10BASE2

1.2 DOCSIS 1-2-3

Cable tv+internet

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DOCSIS

Usually
this tech use TV companies like a bonus to you TV-set

Real speed from 1 to 90Mb/s

On Rush hour your speed and quality of connection will down.

2. Ethernet(twisted pair cat3, cat5, cat5e, cat6, cat7, cat8 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twisted_pair)

ISP_net-Twisted pair-Your home router-your home devices

2.1 Ethernet 100Mb/s

Max speed 100Mb/s.

In practice This is really good tech for home and office use.

For 100Mb/s connection you can use Cat3 cables (2 pair) or standart Cat 4-5-6…

Snadart working line 100m(300ft) but if you use really high quality cables line can reach 170m (500ft).

I buided 150-170m lines using high quality cables.

2.2 Gigabit ethernet

Max speed 500Mb/s

You can be
confused but GIGABIT ethernet have max upload\download rate 500Mb/s not 1000Mb/s

Upload 500Mb/S+download 500Mb/S =1000?

Max distance 100m(300ft)

2.3 Other tech are not for home use

3. Fiber (FTTB=FTTH) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiber_to_the_x

This tech provide connection using fiber optics

Distances from 1m to 100+km(100+miles)

+ high speed

+ Long distances

- 1 client 1 wire

3.1 SFP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_form-factor_pl...

max speed 1G

3.2 SFP+ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_form-factor_pl...

max speed 10G

3.3 PON Passive optical network https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_optical_netw...

Really interesting tech. the same cables like in FTTPB...

+ Distance 40 miles

+ up to 128 clients per wire

+ up to 1,25 Gb/S to one wire

+ TV+Phone+advanced servises

4. WIRELESS (probably i'll describe this in other article)

4.1 WIFI (a,b,g,n)

Speed from 1 Mb/s till 10G.

Check interesting devices from Mikrotik.com and UBNT.com

4.2 2G, 3G, LTE, etc

4.3 Radiorelay

Step 2: Ethernet. Cables

Ethernet

cables.

Q: Why in cable 4 pairs (8 wires)

A: 1. 4 Pairs needed for 1G tech work

2. For 100Mb/s tech you can use only two pairs

2.1 For building home net you can use Cat3 cables. It is cheaper.

2.2 On 2 extra pairs you can do what you want.

Q: What can I do with extra pairs if I use 100 Mb/s techs? Is it safe?

A: 1. POE (check photos). This is safe. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_over_Ethernet

2. 2 100Mb/S lines to Socket. This is safe.

3. 1 100Mb/s line and 2 phone\1isdn lines (Check photos) this is safe

4. 110-220V to power on your router (check energy consumption. Max 500W) this is not safe

5. 100Mb/s line + video surveillance

Q: Why cables have different prices in one cat?

A: Standard twisted pair tech use copper cables with d0.5mm of wire. Pure Copper now is very expensive. That’s why low price cables use Aluminum + copper or even Fe + copper.

Al + copper max distance 90-100m (300ft).

Fe + copper max distance 20-30m. Be really careful – there are many this fake cables coming from China.

Also producers cheating with wire diameter. On market I have seen cables with wires 0.3mm!!!

Step 3: Ethernet Splitter for POE

On photos i show you splitter\injector for POE line. It can be handmaded

Step 4: Terrible Mistakes in Building Home Networks

There are 2 types of cables

1 For indoor use

2 For outdoor use

Indoor cables has week isolation what can be damaged by

1. rain (water + crack isolation = your PC in fire)

2.children

3. animals

4. sun (crack isolation)

5. temperature (crack isolation)

6. mechanical deformation (crack isolation + crack pairs)

7. EMI deformation (Often low price cables are not shielded. Thunderstorm can produce EMI shock and your equipment will be Brocken)

Outdoor cables (often black coloured)

1. Shielded

2. High quality protection against sun\temperature\animals\water….

Step 5: Active Equipment for Home/small Office Use

Q: what is SWITCH

A: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_switch

Usually for home or office usage it will be small box with RJ45 ports with price 10-50$

A2: also there was old device known HUB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethernet_hub

Q: What is router

A: router is device that share your one internet connection to all your devices

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Router_(computing)

Now on shop you can buy
router for any price and any capabilities. All routers are manageable devices. You can change configuration of any router.

Router can be multitech like

1. Fiber optics

2. Ethernet

3. DOSCICS

.... etc

Q: What is access point

A: Access point is any device that provide point to multipoint wireless connection like WIFI, Bluetuth.....

Q: What is network firewall

A:This is really big class of hardware devices that work like a networking filters. Note that Firewall is not a router and router is not firewall. Router can provide some firewall functions. Firewalls can simply protect your equipment from DDOS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firewall_(computing)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial-of-service_at...

Q:What equipment I’ll need for my home to build network with my IoT devices, computers, surveillance, etc…

A: you’ll need

1. Router

2. Switch for cable system

3. 2-4 wireless access point

4. Cables and sockets

5. Additionally I recommend install EMI protection for internal ISP port and EMI filters for wireless system

1-2-3 you can buy all-in-one device. but price from this device starts from 100USD

Step 6: ISP Tricks

I'll add in time more tricks

Q:I have XX Mb/S and this is cool

A: wrong

There are two definition that ISP use

1. Quarantined speed – mean that you’ll receive XXMb/S in 99.9% of time. Usually this is Business and Industry

2. Speed – max “Speed” that can be reached

A2:Usually ISP use NETWORK BALANCING

methods. Ex: on street 20 Houses. Every house connected using 100Mb/S link and any user have 100Mb/s repaired speed. 20Houses connected using one link (ISP-SWITCH-USERS) 100/1GMb/s. When one user download movie from torrent – he has full bandwidth. When 4 users will be download movie – start to work balancing system, and users will get speed down.

20 users * 100Mb/s link = 2000 Mb/s of bandwidth. But balancing will decrease this to wire speed.

100Mb/S / 20Users=5Mb/s

1G / 20 Users = 25mB/s

This trick is really useful in rush hours

Q: Why they use so small links?

A: Bigger link costs more money. In real incoming

100Mb/s link can be divided equally to 100 users, and this users even newer notice that

1G link = 1000-5000 users with NOT GUARANTEED speed of 100Mb/s

10G link 20000-100000

Q: You are kidding? On my office\home I check internet connection via bandwidth test I have really 100500Mb/s

A: In this case works balancing method too. It can be packet aggregation

In a packet-based communications network, packet aggregation is the process of joining multiple packets together into a single transmission unit, in order to reduce the overhead associated with each transmission.

Packet aggregation is useful in situations where each transmission unit may have significant overhead (preambles, headers, cyclic redundancy check, etc.) or where the expected packet size is small compared to the maximum amount of information that can be transmitted.

A2: Speed test J many ISP provide Speed test utility on their servers. This is trick method. User test network connection newer change test server…. That’s why all traffic stay inside ISP net. Try to check on different servers or different countries ;)

A3:Office has Business packet, home has for personal use packet. This is not equal

Story will be continued