Windows 7: Home networking explained

As the guy who reviews networking products, I generally receive a couple of e-mails from readers a day, and most of them, in one way or another, are asking about the basics of networking (as in computer to computer, I am not talking about social networks here.)

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate e-mails because, at the very least, it gives me the impression that there are real people out there amid the sea of spam. But I'd rather not keep repeating myself. So instead of saying the same thing over and over again in individual e-mails, I'll talk all about home networking basics, in layman's terms, in this post.

Advanced and experienced users won't need this, but for the rest, I'd recommend reading the whole thing, and if you want to quickly find out what a networking term means, you can search for it here.

Since my last post on the basics of home networking, which is Part 1 of this series, I've been flooded with even more e-mails than I had been before (which explains why some of you haven't heard back from me). The good news is that nobody is asking about what a router is anymore. I guess I did an OK job explaining that in my previous post.

Most of the e-mails this time asked about how to have the best Wi-Fi coverage at home and avoid "dead zones." A reader even asked me how to make his Wi-Fi network better than his neighbor's because the other network's Wi-Fi signal and Internet speed were "so much faster than mine." Well, I am not a fan of rat races, and you're not supposed to tap into your neighbor's Wi-Fi network unless you both explicitly share an Internet connection, in which case you shouldn't be complaining that the network is so good.

Also it's not exactly a good thing that your Wi-Fi's range goes so far away from your home, either; that only increases the unnecessary interference for your neighborhood (and your network's chance of getting tapped into). In short, you should just focus on yours.

And along those lines, there are a few ways to make sure you get the best out of your Wi-Fi network. With some, you just need to do a little bit of tweaking; with others, depending on your home, you might need to get extra equipment.

Let's start with the ways that probably won't cost you anything, other than a little bit of time.

Now that you have learned about the basics of home networking in part 1, and how to optimize your Wi-Fi in part 2, in part 3, it's time to get your hands dirty and learn how to take control of your network completely.

All home networks start with a network cable. Even if you plan on using all wireless clients, in most cases you will still need at least one cable to connect the wireless router and the broadband modem. A typical home network needs more than that because chances are you also want to connect a few Ethernet-ready devices to the router.

Knowing how to make your own networking cable is an important, handy skill for a few reasons. First, network cables that you buy at the store are generally grossly overpriced: a 7-foot-long cable can run you $20, almost $3 per foot. Secondly, it's hard to find a ready-made cable that's just the perfect length; most of the time it's either too long or too short. When you make your own, the cable will be exactly the length you want, and if it's not, well, you can make another one or adjust it.

You can also make other hardware parts for the network, including network wall ports and patch panels. As you will see after reading this post, this is a skill that's not only easy to learn, it doesn't cost much, either. All the tools you need cost less than $40. Parts, such as patch cable and connectors are also very affordable.

The biggest return on this investment, however, is that you may find making and wiring your own network hardware actually fun, and it gives you complete control of your home network. A well-designed wired home network is also the best in terms of performance, since --for right now, anyway -- cabling is much faster and more reliable than a Wi-Fi signal. If you want to do serious streaming and data sharing within the local network, running network cables is the way to go.

Hey Britton30...its really easy once you set it up...fairly straight forward. Once the homegroup is setup and printer is installed on main PC....then on the rest of the homegroup, in windows 7 and vista, just click devices and printers, then click add printer, then click add network , wireless or bluetooth printer and it should pop up in the list being populated....select the printer and click next and it will install the driver/software for you....then you should get "print test page" if that works you've just successfully added a printer to the network. Then repeat for the rest of PC's on the network.

My home network consists of 3 desktops, 2 laptops, 1 tablet, 2 iopd touch all running different versions of windows and they all print just fine.

Note; for window xp it's just a tad bit different...not hard to figure out.