LAN is a fairly common word that is used when talking about Internet connectivity. It is an acronym for Local area network. It is a network that connects computers and other such devices in a specific geographical area. This area could be a home, school, office building or a neighborhood. Each device in the network is a node.

The most popular LAN technology in use currently is Ethernet. The standard for Ethernet is defined by the Institute for Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). The IEEE Standard 802.3 defines the rules for configuring Ethernet.

Ethernet was developed by a researcher named Robert Metcalfe of the Xerox Corporation in the 1970′s. However it became popular only after Metcalfe convinced Digital Equipment Corporation and Intel to join with Xerox to develop the first draft of the Ethernet standard in 1980.

The first implementation of Ethernet utilized coaxial cables which were about 20 mm in diameter. This came to be known as Thicknet Ethernet. Thinnet Ethernet was introduced later on, which utilized the cable television cable of the time.

The next development was Unshielded Twisted pair (UTP) cable which is a 4 pair cable similar to a telephone cable in both appearance and end connector. It has a variety of grades, of which level 1 is the lowest quality and level 5 is the best.

Level 1 and 2 are mostly used for voice and other low speed transmissions. Level 3 can handle speeds of up to 16mbps, level 4 handles up to 20Mbps and the finest cable level 5 can handle up to 100Mbps.

The first Ethernet switch was introduced in 1990 by a networking equipment manufacturer called Kalpana in the Silicon Valley. An Ethernet switch is a networking device that connects network segments together. It works so as to remove all unneeded traffic from each segment by only forwarding the traffic needed on that segment, which provides better performance on the network.

These switches are used to connect point-to-point links to reduce installation costs and to increase reliability while enabling point-to-point management and troubleshooting.

Communication between Ethernet is in the form of data packets that are both sent and delivered individually. Each Ethernet station is assigned a 48-bt Media Access Control (MAC) address. These MAC addresses are used to specify the source as well as the destination of each data packet.

Ethernet is a technology that has continued to develop since it was developed. The development of technology is integrated into a wider bandwidth, and changes to the paper version. Has now developed the basic technology for existing networks in the local area.

Ethernet has gained much popularity because of decreasing cost of the hardware required to support it and also the less panel space that it requires. For these reasons, most manufacturers directly build the functionality of an Ethernet card into PC motherboards.

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