Modem, Router and Access Point: What\u2019s the Difference? Do you know the difference between, say, a switch and a hub? Keeping straight the devices that help you access the internet is no small feat. This guide explains it all.<\/p>\n
Connecting to the internet seems simple. You hop on your Wi-Fi, load up Facebook, and boom: you\u2019re connected! But when something goes wrong\u2014or it\u2019s time to upgrade your equipment to something faster\u2014you\u2019ll need to understand what all those little black boxes actually do. Here\u2019s a quick rundown of the basic networking gear that keeps your home connected.<\/p>\n
A\u00a0modem\u00a0is your gateway to the internet\u2014a cable, fiber optic, or telephone line comes through your neighborhood, to your house, and connects to your modem. The modem translates the digital 1s and 0s from your computer into analog information for the cable or telephone wire to carry out to the world, and translates incoming analog signals in the same way. This is called\u00a0modulation\u00a0and\u00a0demodulation, respectively, and it\u2019s where the \u201cmo-dem\u201d gets its name.
Typically, your internet service provider (ISP) will provide you with a modem for a small monthly fee. Depending on which ISP you use, however, you may be able to\u00a0buy your own modem\u00a0and save some money.<\/p>\n
If you only had one computer in your house, you could plug it straight into the modem with an Ethernet cable and call it a day\u2014you\u2019d be connected to the internet and watching cat videos instantly.<\/p>\n
But most people have more than one computer in their house, not to mention smartphones,\u00a0tablets, e-readers, and a host of other devices. Standalone modems aren\u2019t able to send data to multiple devices simultaneously: they usually only have one Ethernet port, and only produce one\u00a0IP address, which identifies your location to the internet (kind of like your street address does in the real world).
A\u00a0router\u00a0connects all your home\u2019s devices to each other\u2014through Ethernet cables or Wi-Fi\u2014and then connects to the modem. It gives each device its own internal IP address, which it uses to\u00a0route\u00a0traffic between them. If your modem\u2019s IP address is like the street address of a building, your router\u2019s internal IP addresses are like apartment numbers. Your modem receives information from the internet, sends it to the router, and the router sends it to the computer that asked for it. (That way, your phone doesn\u2019t receive the cat videos you asked for on your laptop.)
The network created by your router is known as a local area network, or LAN, and it connects you to a larger wide area network, or WAN. In most home cases, your WAN is, for all intents and purposes, the internet.
Not all\u00a0routers\u00a0include Wi-Fi\u2014some merely connect computers with Ethernet cables. That\u2019s where the next piece of equipment comes in.<\/p>\n
Modem Router and Access Point: What\u2019s the Difference? Modem, Router and Access Point: What\u2019s the Difference? Do you know the difference between, say, a switch and a hub? Keeping straight the devices that help you access the internet is no small feat. This guide explains it all. Connecting to the internet seems simple. You hop […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tech-news"],"yoast_head":"\n