Eg.

fax
Basics of Computer Network Hardware

Network
A set of cooperative interconnected computers for the purpose of information interchange. This includes:
1. Local Area Network (LAN)
Supports interconnected computer needs of a single company or agency.
2. Wide Area Network (WAN)
Supports geographically dispersed facilities.
Eg. national coverage
3. Internet

Network Hardware- provides interconnection between computers

Components:
1. Network adapter/ network interface card
It is a computer circuit board or card that is installed in a computer so that it can be connected into a
network.
2. Communication medium (cabling)
It is a means by which actual transfer of data from one site to another takes place.
Eg. Twisted pair cable, coaxial cable, fiber-optics, telephone lines, satellites, and compressed video.

Essentials of a Communication Medium:

a. Distance requirements
Short distance-compressed video and coaxial cables
Long distance- Fiber-optics, telephone lines and satellite transmission

b. Amount of data transfer

Large amount of data (eg. video)- best handled with coaxial cables and compressed video and satellite
communications
Small amount of data or serial (non-video)- can be handled by twisted pair copper wire and optical fiber

c. How the transfer is needed

Constant use of limited users- Coaxial
High usage of public networks (internet)-telephone wires

d. Availability
This depends on cost, transmission speed, number of users, weather conditions, etc.
Telephone Line Communications
Also called as the Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN)
Lines used to carry sets of communication standards for optical fibers that carry voice, digital and video
signals across phone lines.

Types of ISDN Connections with different bandwidth (controls how fast the signals can be transmitted
across the phone lines)
DS0- Digital bandwidth- zeroth level- 64 kilobytes/sec

T-lines- used to handle high-speed transmissions needed for network communications

Cable Modem
A cable network can achieve speed faster than the maximum speed of a telephone modem connection
An external cable modem box is added to the computer configuration which contains:
Tuner- receives signals and passes these to the demodulator
Demodulator- takes radio and analog information and converts it to digital data, performs data correction
functions, checks for problem transmissions and passes the signal to the modulator.

Modulator- works with upstream traffic to convert the digital signals into radio frequency signals
MAC (Multiple Access)- acts as an interface between the various parts of the network protocols
CPU
Network hardware

Server