2. A Wide Area Network (WAN) is a telecommunication network that
spans a large geographic area. It usually connects two or more Local
Area Networks (LAN) by means of dedicated lines or packet/circuit
switching.
3. Characteristics of a WAN
The best example of a Wide Area Network is The
Internet!
A WAN consists of a large numbers of nodes/hosts
that are interconnected by a subnet
To be considered a WAN, the network must span
30+
miles
4. WAN Applications
Wide Area Networks can be used in most any
application of transmitting voice, video, or data across
long distances
Voice: most phone service providers merge hundreds &
thousands of analog phone calls onto a single digital
medium for transmission across town or across the country
Video: dedicated WAN systems, such as ATM(explained
later) allow for high-quality video stream with low latency
Data: the creation of a direct connection between twonodes
on a private WAN is much more efficient & secure that
sending data across with general Internet traffic
6. WAN Technologies
A WAN can use multiple types of telecommunication mediums…
Copper Wire
Fiber Optic Cabling
Radio Links
Satellite Links
The Data Link Layer (OSI layer 2) uses various protocols along these
mediums to describe how frames are encapsulated & transmitted.
Some common ones are…
Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN)
Integrated Service Digital Network (ISDN)
Frame Relay
Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM)
7. Leased Lines
Dedicated connections that are usually leased through a
network carrier
Available in various capacities depending upon distance
between sites & bandwidth required.
While very reliable, cost is considerably more than other WAN
options that utilize shared (switch) connections
8. Circuit Switching Networks
These networks establish a dedicated circuit (or
channel)
between nodes for users to communicate
This means that every switch along the network is
set in such a fashion that the data flows continuously
from node to node
9. Public Switched Telephone Network
A Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP) network that may consist of more than
one leg between two hosts, however the source & destination are
connected by a direct connection
Very popular option for using a dial-up telephone modems. This is an
example of a circuit-switched network
Authentication is supported with Password Authentication Protocol
(PAP) & Challenge Handshake Authentication Protocol (CHAP)
10. Integrated Service Digital
Network
International communication standard for sending
voice,
video & data via telephone wires
Works much like PSTN, but offers higher speeds
closer to DSL rather than 56Kbps analog dial-up service
11. Packet Switching Networks
In contrast to circuit switching, packet switching
splits traffic into packets that are individually routed
over a shared network
DO NOT require a dedicated circuit to be
established; allows many pairs of nodes to
communicate over the same channel
Each switch in the network routes a packet based
upon the addressing information in the header frame
12. Packet Switching Networks
(cont.)
Connectionless Systems carry full addressing
information requiring each switch to completely evaluate
routing
Connection-Oriented Systems predetermine the route
for each packet.
Packets are only required to carry an identifier in the header
Each switch has a table of predetermined routes that correspond
to different identifies stored in memory. The identifier on the
packet is checked with this listing & then assigned a route by the
router
13. Frame Relay
Creates a private network connection through a carrier's network
T1 Line (or other leased line) from network carrier along with a frame-
relay port. The network can be designed to include as many nodes as
needed, each connected via a Permanent Virtual Circuit (PVC). This is
an example of packet-switched network
This option is fairly cheap because each connecting node only needs
a PVC & leased line to be connected with the WAN
This technology is slowly
being replaced by faster services
14. Asynchronous Transfer
Mode
ATM is a dedicated connection-oriented switching system that
organizes all data into 53-byte cells before digitally sending
them
Each cell is processed asynchronously relative to other cells &
is queued before being multiplexed over the transmission path
Low latency coupled with speeds up to 10Gbps, makes the
technology ideal with high intensity video data applications
16. Public WAN’s
The Internet
In contrary to private WAN’s, public WAN’s have no isolation between
users/customers
Cheaper, greater bandwidth (usually gigabit or higher)
DSL, Cable Modem, Fiber Optic, etc.
Companies can create virtual WAN’s by use of technologies such as
VPN that “tunnel” & encrypt traffic over the general-public Internet
17. Public WAN’s Threat
to Private WAN’s
Virtual Private Networks (VPN) allows the creation
a ofvirtual point-to-point connection means of
dedicated connections, tunneling protocols, or traffic
encryption.
These networks are much cheaper than WAN’s & allow
more flexibility as they only need an Internet connection
to operate.
Cloud computing is more cheaper & simple to utilize
in
most applications today.
In 2014, one survey of IT professionals indicated that nearly 50%
of those currently using WAN technologies were in the process of
18.
19. REVIEW: WAN Connection Types
WAN
Private
Dedicated
Leased
Lines
T1, T3,
E3….etc.
Switched
Circuit-
Switched
PSTN
ISDN
Packet-
Switched
Frame Relay
ATM
Public
Internet
Broadban
d
VPN
DSL
Cable
Modem