Summary

In this chapter, you learned about the items that can be found on a typical network. You first learned what a network is and the various elements that make up a network, such as servers, workstations, and hosts. Then you learned about the different ways of laying out a network. You learned about bus, star, ring, mesh, hybrid, and wireless topologies.

You also learned about the different types of physical media in use on networks today, including coaxial, twisted-pair, and fiber-optic media. Finally, you learned about some common network devices—including NICs, hubs, switches, bridges, routers, and gateways—seen on a typical network.