Setting up an office network for a medium to large-sized business is pretty different to configuring a home wireless network. There are typically more components required in the establishment of an office network. Business owners can benefit from learning a little bit about the kind of hardware and software that they’ll need to acquire in order to provide a strong and secured network to their staff.
To help out, our computer specialists have outlined the main components that you’ll need to set up a network for a medium to large-sized enterprise below.
Ethernet cabling
Any device that’s accessing a network is doing so in either of the following two ways: wirelessly or via ethernet cables. These unique networking cables are used to carry broadband signals from your modem and router and to all wired internet-capable devices. Ethernet cables can also be used to boost connection speeds for wireless-capable devices, just so long as that device has an ethernet port or an ethernet adaptor is available.
It’s important to keep in mind that there are different different ethernet cables, just as there are different kinds of USB cables. For example, Category 5 (or Cat5) ethernet cables are generally used for data networking, whilst Cat6 cables are compatible for voice applications and VoIP (‘Voice over Internet Protocol’) phones. Understanding what cables you’ll need for each device in your office can help ensure that your office network is correctly configured and fully operational.
Network modem and router
Just like your home network, your office modem is a device that connects your network up to your ISP (or ‘internet service provider’), whereas your router is tasked with communicating this network signal to all the wired and wireless devices on your network. Your router also allows these devices to communicate with one another within your office network, creating a connected ecosystem. You may know this ‘connected ecosystem’ by its more technical name: a local area network (or ‘LAN’).
Wireless access points
If you’ve ever had bandwidth issues on your home WiFi network, then you may already know all too well that your network router only has so much capacity for transmitting your network connection to other devices. LANs are limited by the signal strength and connection bandwidth provided by your ISP, as well as the bandwidth capacity of your router.
So what do you do if your router isn’t strong enough to provide adequate bandwidth to all the devices on your network? There are typically three options here. The first option is you invest in a more powerful router and swap this one out for your current router. This will enable your network to operate at a higher bandwidth capacity.
Network switch
Network switches (also referred to as ‘ethernet switches’) are networking devices that effectively allow you to connect up a large number of wired internet-capable devices to a single connectivity hub. As you may imagine, ethernet switches are able to free up your network bandwidth by connecting devices up to your network via ethernet cabling rather than wirelessly. Having all your desktop PCs, printers, and IoT devices connected up via ethernet to a network switch allows more bandwidth for all your wireless devices, like laptops, mobile phones, and tablets.
Managed network switches can also be used to set up VLANs (or ‘virtual local area networks’) on your office network. As its name suggests, a VLAN is effectively a method of segmenting the traffic on your overall LAN or office network. For instance, offices could set up VLANs for individual departments, with each department having its own network access password. By setting up VLANs and segmenting your network, offices can effectively reduce the risks of hacking activities or malware gaining access to your entire network.
Patch panels
A patch panel is a networking device that’s designed to provide support for larger network switches. If you have more devices to connect up than there are ethernet ports available on your network switch, then a patch panel can be installed to connect all your devices up via ethernet cabling.
Network devices/clients
Finally, the last component you’ll need for your office network is, of course, the devices that you’ll be using to carry out your business. Network devices (or network clients) refer to all the desktop PCs, printers, laptops, mobile devices, VoIP phones, and every other wireless or wired internet-capable device that will be connected to your LAN and installed or positioned within your office. Configuring your network clients should be a familiar process, as it’s virtually the same as connecting any of your home devices up to your home WiFi network. All you need to do is type in your access password or connect your device up to your office ethernet switch, and you should be connected up to the world wide web through your office’s computer network.
By monitoring your network performance over the long term, you can equip yourself with a working understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of your office computer network, and how it can be amended to suit your business’ evolving needs.