| The way that it used to be, is people generally | | | | a home network. With a home based network |
| had one computer in their home. World Wide Web | | | | you are technically building a local area network, |
| access was based on dial-up modems which were | | | | which can be wired or wireless, that networked |
| connected directly with a serial cable on the home | | | | devices communicate between inside the home, |
| computer. No Local Area Network was needed. | | | | and also share the same internet connection. |
| The fast progression of modern technology and | | | | The base of the home network is your |
| the wide spread adoption of high speed internet | | | | broadband router. This is most of the time an |
| connectivity at homes, necessitates that home | | | | integrated wired or wireless device which allows |
| appliances should be networked to facilitate online | | | | you to build and setup a home LAN. This router |
| access and to also communicate and share | | | | also gives you the internet access. |
| information between them. | | | | Once you have your home network setup, you |
| What I mean when I say home appliances is | | | | can connect your computers, laptops, Xbox 360, |
| home computers, next generation game consoles, | | | | Playstation 3, servers, network storage boxes, |
| printers, scanners, network attached storage, etc. | | | | etc. After you successfully connect all your |
| All of these "Appliances" need to share | | | | devices to the router, you can share and |
| information amongst themselves over a network, | | | | distribute your files over the network, have LAN |
| but also need to have high-speed access to the | | | | parties on game consoles, play online video |
| Internet. To achieve that, you will need to set-up | | | | games, and share pictures between computer. |