Module 5 - The Basic of Computer Networking
Module 5 - The Basic of Computer Networking
A Personal Area Network or PAN has been around for When it comes to the MAN network type, know that it is
quite sometime and this type of network focuses on a usually a large computer network on a large
person’s workspace. A Personal Area Network handles geographical area that includes several buildings and
data transmission within devices such as tablets, LANs, or even the entire city or metropolitan area. The
personal digital assistants, smartphones, and computers. geographical area of the MAN is larger than LAN, but
Note that single users in most cases basically use this smaller than WAN, which makes it fall in between a
type of network. People make use of these types of Local Area Network and a Wide Area Network.
networks commonly in situations where they need to
connect wearable or mobile devices.
4. Wide Area Network (WAN)
A Local Area Network or LAN as it’s commonly known is This kind of network is suitable for providing Internet
a network that connects devices usually in the same access to Local Area Networks or some other kinds of
building or local area. This could be computers or other networks. Wide area network communications often
devices that are within an office building, which are require networking devices such as routers and modems
connected together to share resources. for effective data communication.
Most people make use of this network type to share files Moreover, WANs are usually provided by ISPs which are
and other business-related documents in an interconnected to offer communication to wider areas. A
organization. A router is often used when multiple Local WAN link is usually referring to a network interface that
Area Networks need to be connected to each other. A
provides connection of the smaller network towards the Have in mind that a VPN is also used to connect LAN
bigger WAN network. A WAN link can be fiber optic, networks that are far away between them. For example,
Ethernet Layer2 VPN, Layer 3 MPLS vpn etc. a company has different buildings (with LAN networks) in
different Cities and wants to interconnect the buildings
over the Internet. A VPN will provide an ideal and cheap
5. Wireless LAN (WLAN) solution for such a case.