How to Set up a Home Network

In the world of computers, networking is the practice of linking two or more computing devices together for the purpose of sharing data. Some people ask why should I need to set up a home network. There are several advantages to setting up a home network. Often you might want a file or program they\'ve downloaded from the Net to be available to all of the computers at home. With a home network files can be shared more conveniently, faster eliminating passing files around on floppies or CD and sharing files. You can also copy or move files remotely, without needing physically visit the computer involved.You can share printers, CD-ROM drives and any other removeable drives between the computers. With home networking you can share a single Internet connection between two or more computers to save money. One computer will connect to the Internet with a modem and the other computer will route its Internet traffic through the same connection. If you like playing multi-user computer games that have network capabilities built in, then two people can play these games together over the network. Also you can save space on other PC\'s hard drives, by storing larger files only a single copy of large files.

Computer networking has existed for more than thirty years, but only more recently they have become popular in homes. In 1999, only a few hundred thousand households in the United States had a home network. When Windows 95 first came out, creating a home network was a huge task. Now there are ways to set up a home network that the toughest part is physically installing the hardware. There are a lot

of things you need to think about before setting up a home network. First you need to think of what operating system you want to use. Before Windows XP came out the hardest part was dealing with installing the software and configuring it. Now, Windows XP makes it easy. You can network computers that run different operating systems, but setting up a small home local area network I believe Windows XP is the best choice for your operating system. Windows XP provides a wizard for network connection setup. Wizards break down a task into individual steps and quide the user through the steps one at a time. The Windows XP New Connection Wizard supports twp basic types of Internet connections, dial up and broadband.

Dial up networking technology provides PCs and other network devices access to a local area network (LAN) or Wide Area Network (WAN) through a standard telephone lines. Dial up Internet service providers offer subscription plans for home computer users. Dial up is a lot

less expensive than broadband but is a lot

slower and ties up your telephone line. Broadband in home netorking usually refers to high-speed Internet access using transmission technique. Both DSL and cable modem are common broadband Internet technologies. DSL combines separate voice and data channel over a single telephone line. Cable is faster than DSL in theory. However, cable does not always deliver on the promise in everyday practical use. Both DSL and cable speeds exceed those of competing Internet services. Are DSL or cable any faster than each other? More importantly, are you getting all of the performance you should from your Internet connection? Cable modem services can slow down significantly if many people in your neighborhood access the Internet simultaenously. Both cable modem and DSL performance vary from one minute to the next depending on the pattern of use and traffic congestion on the Internet. DSL and cable Internet providers often implement so-called \"speed caps\" that limit the bandwidth of their services. Some home networks cannot match the speed of the Internet connection, lowering your performance.Cable modem Internet services on average promise higher levels of bandwidth than DSL Internet services, and this bandwidth roughly translates to fast speeds. However, while cable Internet will theoretically run faster than DSL, several technical and business reasons can reduce or even eliminate this advantage. In terms of performance, cable modem runs faster than DSL. Cable technology supports approximately 30 Mbps of bandwidth, whereas most forms of DSL cannot reach 10 Mbps. One type of DSL technology, VDSL, can match cable\'s performance, also supporting 30 Mbps of bandwidth, where as most forms of DSL can\'t reach 10 Mbps.