Managing a small business network can be tough work, but it is a fun and exciting career, than provides endless opportunities for learning new technologies and ideas. Although this is a good career choice, there are many times where this job can be frustrating and tough. The frustrating times come when mission critical equipment fails, or a configuration file gets corrupted. First I will talk about the equipment needed to make a small business network function, with minimal errors. Next I will explain the pros and cons to managing a small business network. Lastly I will talk about what I recommend for a small business network.
To start the body off, I will be explaining what equipment is needed to start a small business network. First we have our routers and switches. Routers perform many functions, one of which is serving as a firewall. Computers have tens of thousands of ports, or "doors" as this essay will refer to them as. Without a firewall, all the doors on the computer are unlocked and available for anyone to use. Anyone could be your brother sending an email, or hacker from Indonesia using your computer to send SPAM. Firewall's will recognize all the doors your computer isn't using and lock them, so no one can use the doors, unless you know the password for the firewall. Routers also have various other functions, which may or may not be used by businesses; it all depends on your application. Switches take one internet connection and split it into many connections. Fore example, if you have a cable modem and you want six computers online, you will need to get six IP addresses from your ISP and use a switch to split the one incoming connection. An IP address is like a street address, one per computer or connection to the internet. Switches can also be used as device for connecting computers in a network. If you had seven computers, and only one had a printer