Local Area Network Advantages And Disadvantages



Local Area Networks (LAN) and a Wide Area Network (WAN) are similar in many ways. However, there are enough differences between the two to make them two separate acronyms. In any discussion regarding LAN vs WAN, it’s important to weigh the pros and cons, as the respective advantages and disadvantages can affect your business’ productivity significantly. Contact Tribus Computer today to discuss how either can be optimized for your company’s needs.

Full form of LAN is Local Area Network. In order to understand this term better one should look at the advantages and disadvantages of LAN – Advantages of LAN Easy and Cheap. The biggest advantage of local area network is that it is easy to setup and also cheap as compared to other options and therefore if the company is looking for setting up a network at low cost and with ease than local area network is the answer for such companies. Disadvantages of local area network (LAN). Data Security – Data security is easy in LAN because all the computers are connected to the server system and all the data is stored at one place in the server so easy to maintain secured too. Local Area Network provides the facility to share a single internet connection among all the LAN users.

Let’s take a look at LAN vs WAN so you get a better idea of how either can meet the needs of your business. Be sure to also check out our Ultimate Guide To Picking The Best IT Services Management. Tribus Computer can help you save time and money, both of which are at a premium like never before.

What You Need To Know About Local Area Networks (LANs)

Disadvantages of LAN. The disadvantages of LAN are: LAN networks come out to be cost-effective and time-saving, as we can share various resources on one platform. However, the initial installation cost of the network is very high. It is having a geographical area limitation and can only cover a small area (1-5 km). Advantages Disadvantages of LAN - Local Area Network: Advantages of LAN or Local Area Network. Resource Sharing. Although the LAN will save cost over time due to shared computer resources but the initial setup costs of installing Local Area Networks is high. This is because any organization that will setup a network, will have to. Advantages And Disadvantages Of Local Area Network  Wireless Local Area Network Background The first wireless computer communication network ALOHAnet (operational in 1971) was developed by Norman Abramson, a professor at the University of Hawaii At first, the wireless LAN was so costly that it was just used as an alternative to the places where the cabling was difficult or impossible.

As per the name, Local Area Networks (LAN) connections operate in a local area, not any bigger than your house, or a single floor in your office building. A LAN can operate at great speeds, and it isn’t uncommon to see technology ready for 1Gbps (1 gigabit per second). According to PacketWorks, for example, if you were to download all 3,816,000 English articles off of Wikipedia it would take just over 13 hours to do so; the same task on a WAN would take 16 days. A LAN, therefore, can operate up to 30x faster than a WAN.

A LAN connection is also cost-friendly and easy to set up. All you need are some Ethernet cables and a network switch, and you are all set. Additionally, you can see LANs being utilized over Wi-Fi, or you can use Wi-Fi in conjunction with standard Ethernet connections to create a LAN available to all kinds of devices, whether it be a smartphone or a desktop computer.

All of the above points us to the major disadvantage of a LAN, namely its locality. These networks are only as good as the length of your Ethernet cable or the scope of your Wi-Fi signal. Once out of those ranges, the network is unavailable.

Ideal Usage: Interconnect computers within a limited area such as a residence, school, laboratory, university campus or office building.

LAN – Pros & Cons

ProsCons
SpeedLimited to Small Area
Cost
Easy to set up

LANs are accessible via Wi-Fi or ethernet cable and are limited in range.

What You Need To Know About Wide Area Networks (WANs)

A Wide Area Network (WAN) connection occurs in large environments and is available from house to house, city to city, and country to country. The fact that you are reading this article means you have access to a WAN: the Internet!

A WAN connection is generally harder to set up than a LAN, and there are many creative ways to do so. You can rent a line from an internet service provider and use their network, or you can connect the devices with various wireless technologies, like cell phone towers or satellites. These methods almost always demand high-level professional setup and maintenance.

Due to its massive size and scope, a WAN is almost always slower than a LAN, as the further the distance, the slower the network. One of the other major disadvantages to having a WAN is the cost it can incur, as having a private WAN can be expensive. The reason that WANs cost a lot tends to be because of the technology required to connect two remote places.

Ideal Usage: Business, education and government entities use wide area networks to relay data to staff, students, clients, buyers, and suppliers from various locations across the world.

WAN – Pros & Cons

ProsCons
Cost
Speed
Ease

WANs are wide in scope and connect people all over the world.

LAN vs WAN? Trust Tribus Computer To Help Get You Connected

At Tribus Computer, we recognize that today’s network is no longer as simple as connecting a few computers in the office together. The corporate network has become a critical component of your business operation. Many businesses now require management and staff to access the corporate network 24/7 whether in the office, from home, or from other remote locations.

In addition, the possibility of unauthorized users accessing your network has become a real concern. At Tribus Computer we understand these issues and can design and implement a network to ensure security, reliability, and availability.

Tribus Computer manages total IT services in the GTA and can set up a LAN or connect you to a WAN for your business; Contact us today for your free quote.

Local Area Network Advantages And Disadvantages Social

Ethernet is Local Area Network (LAN) technology. This system consists of rules to connect multiple systems on the LAN network connection. Apart from LAN, it is also used in Metropolitan Area Network (MAN) and Wide Area Network (WAN) network. A system for connecting a number of computer systems to form a local area network, with rules to control the flow of data and to avoid any error during the transmission by two or more systems. Robert Metcalfe invented Ethernet technology. It is standardized as IEEE 802.3

Ethernet operates at the link layer in TCP/IP model architecture. It offers connectionless communication and before transferring any data over the network, the system checks if the access medium is free to transfer data. It determines free medium using Carrier Sense Multiple Access/Collision Detection (CSMA/CD). Also, it is built on a star topology.

Ethernet uses two types of cables :

  • Twisted pair.
  • Fibre optic.

Basically it is characterised into three types of ethernet based on data transfer speed viz.

  • Basic ethernet is slowest among all, which provide the speed of(about 10Mbps, 2500 meters).
  • fast ethernet (about 100Mbps, 250 meters) which is intermediate between basic and Gigabit network.
  • Gigabit ethernet (about 1Gbps, 250 meters).

Passive Optical Local Area Network Advantages And Disadvantages

Advantages of Ethernet :

Disadvantages
  • The fastest speed provide by Gigabit ethernet is of 1Gbps. The speed ranges from more than 10 times Fast Ethernet.
  • To form an Ethernet, we don’t need much cost. It is relatively inexpensive. Total cost induced is less.
  • In Ethernet, all the node have an equivalent privileges. It does not follow client-server architecture.
  • It does not require any switches or hubs
  • Maintenance and administration are simple.
  • The cable wont to connect systems in ethernet is strong to noise.
  • As it is strong to the noise, the standard of the info transfer doesn’t degrade. The data transfer quality is good.
  • With latest versions such as gigabit ethernet and wireless ethernet (IEEE 802.11ac/11ad) transfer speeds in data with the speed of 1-100Gbps.

Disadvantages of Ethernet :

Local Area Network Advantages And Disadvantages Using

  • It offers a nondeterministic service.
  • It doesn’t hold good for real-time applications because it requires deterministic service.
  • As priority packets cannot be set, it’s not suitable for a client-server architecture.
  • In an interactive application, data is extremely small and wish quick data transfer. In ethernet, there’s a limit of the minimum size of the frame to 46B. As a result, it’s not an honest choice for interactive applications.
  • If you’re using it for interactive applications, you’ve got to feed dummy data to form the frame size 46B which is mandatory.
  • Not suitable for traffic-intensive applications. In case the rate of traffic on the Ethernet goes up the efficiency of the Ethernet goes down.
  • It provides connectionless communication over the network.
  • The receiver cannot able to send any knowledge after receiving the packets.
  • If there’s any problem in ethernet, it’s difficult to troubleshoot what cable or node within the network causing an actual problem.
  • The 100Base-T4 version does not support full-duplex data communication mode.

Attention reader! Don’t stop learning now. Get hold of all the important CS Theory concepts for SDE interviews with the CS Theory Course at a student-friendly price and become industry ready.

Recommended Posts:

If you like GeeksforGeeks and would like to contribute, you can also write an article using contribute.geeksforgeeks.org or mail your article to contribute@geeksforgeeks.org. See your article appearing on the GeeksforGeeks main page and help other Geeks.

Disadvantages Of Lan Network

Please Improve this article if you find anything incorrect by clicking on the 'Improve Article' button below.