Module 3

Networking Media

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 Atoms and Electrons
• All matter is composed of atoms. The Periodic Table of
Elements lists all known types of atoms and their properties.
• The atom is comprised of:
– Electrons – Particles with a negative charge that orbit the nucleus
– Nucleus – The center part of the atom, composed of protons and
neutrons
– Protons – Particles with a positive charge
– Neutrons – Particles with no charge (neutral)

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 Atoms and Electrons
• Atoms, or groups of atoms called molecules, can be referred to
as materials.
• Materials are classified as belonging to one of three groups
depending on how easily electricity, or free electrons, flows
through them.
• Three classifications:
– Conductors
– Semiconductors
– Insulators
• The basis for all electronic devices is the knowledge of how
these three classifications control the flow of electrons and work
together in various combinations.

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 Voltage
• Voltage is sometimes referred to as electromotive force (EMF).
• EMF is related to an electrical force, or pressure, that occurs
when electrons and protons are separated.
• The force that is created pushes toward the opposite charge
and away from the like charge.
• Voltage is represented by the letter V, and sometimes by the
letter E, for electromotive force.
• The unit of measurement for voltage is volt (V).
• Volt is defined as the amount of work, per unit charge, needed
to separate the charges.

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 Resistance and Impedance
• The materials through which current flows offer varying
amounts of opposition, or resistance to the movement of the
electrons.
• The materials that offer very little, or no, resistance, are called
conductors.
• Those materials that do not allow the current to flow, or
severely restrict its flow, are called insulators.

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 Resistance and Impedance
• All materials that conduct electricity have a measure of
resistance to the flow of electrons through them.
• These materials also have other effects called capacitance and
inductance associated with the flow of electrons.
• These three characteristics (resistance, capacitance, and
inductance) comprise impedance, which is similar to and
includes resistance.
• Attenuation refers to the resistance to the flow of electrons and
why a signal becomes degraded as it travels along the conduit.
• The letter R represents resistance. The unit of measurement for
resistance is the ohm (Ω).

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 Current
• Electrical current is the flow of charges created when electrons
move.
• In electrical circuits, the current is caused by a flow of free
electrons.
• When voltage, or electrical pressure, is applied and there is a
path for the current, electrons move from the negative terminal
along the path to the positive terminal.
• The letter “I” represents current.
• The unit of measurement for current is Ampere (Amp).

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 Circuits
• Current flows in closed loops called circuits.
• These circuits must be composed of conducting materials, and
must have sources of voltage.
• Voltage causes current to flow, while resistance and impedance
oppose it.

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 Cable Specifications

• Cables have different specifications and expectations pertaining

to performance:
– What speeds for data transmission can be achieved using a
particular type of cable?
– What kind of transmission is being considered?
– How far can a signal travel through a particular type of cable
before attenuation of that signal becomes a concern?

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 Cable Specifications
• Some examples of Ethernet specifications which relate to cable
type include:
– 10BASE-T
– 10BASE5
– 10BASE2

• 10BASE-T refers to the speed of transmission at 10 Mbps.

• The type of transmission is baseband, or digitally interpreted.
• The T stands for twisted pair.

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 Coaxial Cable
• Coaxial cable consists of a hollow outer cylindrical conductor
that surrounds a single inner wire made of two conducting
elements.
• One of these elements, located in the center of the cable, is a
copper conductor.
• Surrounding the copper conductor is a layer of flexible
insulation.
• Over this insulating material is a woven copper braid or metallic
foil that acts as the second wire in the circuit and as a shield for
the inner conductor.

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 Coaxial Cable

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 Coaxial Cable

• For LANs, coaxial cable offers several advantages.

– It can be run longer distances than shielded twisted pair, STP, and
unshielded twisted pair, UTP, cable without the need for repeaters.
– Coaxial cable is less expensive than fiber-optic cable, and the
technology is well known.

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 Shielded Twisted-Pair
• Shielded twisted-pair cable (STP) combines the techniques of
shielding, cancellation, and twisting of wires.
• Each pair of wires is wrapped in metallic foil.
• The four pairs of wires are wrapped in an overall metallic braid
or foil.
• STP affords greater protection from all types of external
interference, but is more expensive and difficult to install than
UTP.
• The metallic shielding materials in STP need to be grounded at
both ends.

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 Unshielded Twisted-Pair
• Unshielded twisted-pair cable (UTP) is a four-pair wire medium
used in a variety of networks.
• Each of the 8 individual copper wires in the UTP cable is
covered by insulating material.
• In addition, each pair of wires is twisted around each other.
• This type of cable relies solely on the cancellation effect
produced by the twisted wire pairs, to limit signal degradation
caused by EMI and RFI.
• CAT 5 is the one most frequently recommended and
implemented in installations today.

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 Unshielded Twisted-Pair
• Unshielded twisted-pair cable has many advantages. It is easy
to install and is less expensive than other types of networking
media.
• However, the real advantage is the size. Since it has such a
small external diameter, UTP does not fill up wiring ducts as
rapidly as other types of cable.

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 Optical Media
• The laws of reflection and refraction illustrate how to design a
fiber that guides the light waves through the fiber with a
minimum energy loss. The following two conditions must be
met for the light rays in a fiber to be reflected back into the fiber
without any loss due to refraction:
– The core of the optical fiber has to have a larger index of refraction
(n) than the material that surrounds it. The material that surrounds
the core of the fiber is called the cladding.
– The angle of incidence of the light ray is greater than the critical
angle for the core and its cladding.
• When both of these conditions are met, the entire incident light
in the fiber is reflected back inside the fiber. This is called total
internal reflection, which is the foundation upon which optical
fiber is constructed.

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 Optical Media
• The part of an optical fiber through which light rays travel is
called the core of the fiber.
• If the diameter of the core of the fiber is large enough so that
there are many paths that light can take through the fiber, the
fiber is called “multimode” fiber.
• Single-mode fiber has a much smaller core that only allows light
rays to travel along one mode inside the fiber.

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 Optical Media
• Every fiber-optic cable used for networking consists of two
glass fibers encased in separate sheaths.
• One fiber carries transmitted data from device A to device B.
• The second fiber carries data from device B to device A.
• This provides a full-duplex communication link.

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 Multimode Fiber-Optic Cable
• A standard multimode fiber-optic
cable uses an optical fiber with either
a 62.5 or a 50-micron core and a 125-
micron diameter cladding.
• This is commonly designated as
62.5/125 or 50/125 micron optical
fiber. A micron is one millionth of a
meter (1µ).

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 Single-Mode Fiber-Optic Cable
• Single-mode fiber consists of the
same parts as multimode. The outer
jacket of single-mode fiber is usually
yellow.
• The major difference between
multimode and single-mode fiber is
that single-mode allows only one
mode of light to propagate through the
smaller, fiber-optic core.
• The single-mode core is eight to ten
microns in diameter.
• Nine-micron cores are the most
common.

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 Single-Mode Fiber-Optic Cable
• Because of its design, single-mode fiber is capable of higher
rates of data transmission (bandwidth) and greater cable run
distances than multimode fiber.
• Single-mode fiber can carry LAN data up to 3000 meters.
• Multimode is only capable of carrying up to 2000 meters.
• Lasers and single-mode fibers are more expensive than LEDs
and multimode fiber.
• Because of these characteristics, single-mode fiber is often
used for inter-building connectivity.

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 Fiber-Optic Transmission
• Most of the data sent over a LAN is in the form of electrical
signals.
• However, optical fiber links use light to send data.
• Something is needed to convert the electricity to light and at the
other end of the fiber convert the light back to electricity.
• This means that a transmitter and a receiver are required.

Receivers react to the light wavelengths

and use PIN photodiodes to convert the
light pulses to electrical pulses.

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 Fiber-Optic Transmission
• Fiber-optic cable is not affected by the sources of external
noise that cause problems on copper media because external
light cannot enter the fiber except at the transmitter end.
• A buffer and an outer jacket that stops light from entering or
leaving the cable cover the cladding.
• Furthermore, the transmission of light on one fiber in a cable
does not generate interference that disturbs transmission on
any other fiber.

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 Fiber-Optic Transmission
• Although fiber is the best of all the transmission media at
carrying large amounts of data over long distances, fiber is not
without problems.
• When light travels through fiber, some of the light energy is lost.
• This attenuation of the signal is due to several factors involving
the nature of fiber itself.
– Scattering - caused by microscopic non-uniformity (distortions) in
the fiber that reflects and scatters some of the light energy
– Absorption - impurities absorb part of the energy
– Dispersion - spreading of pulses of light

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 Fiber-Optic Installation
• A major cause of too much attenuation in fiber-optic cable is
improper installation.
• When the fiber has been pulled, the ends of the fiber must be
cleaved (cut) and properly polished to ensure that the ends are
smooth.
• Then the connector is carefully attached to the fiber end.
• Once the fiber-optic cable and connectors have been installed,
the connectors and the ends of the fibers must be kept
spotlessly clean.
• The ends of the fibers should be covered with protective covers
to prevent damage to the fiber ends.

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 Fiber-Optic Installation
• Scattering, absorption, dispersion, improper installation, and
dirty fiber ends diminish the strength of the light signal and are
referred to as fiber noise.
• When a fiber-optic link is being planned, the amount of signal
power loss that can be tolerated must be calculated.
• This is referred to as the optical link loss budget.
• The decibel (dB) is the unit used to measure the amount of
power loss.

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 Wireless Networks
• The IEEE 802.11 standard was developed for wireless
networks.
• Key technology contained within the 802.11 standard is Direct
Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS).
• DSSS applies to wireless devices operating within a 1 to 2
Mbps range.
• A DSSS system may operate at up to 11 Mbps but will not be
considered compliant above 2 Mbps.

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 Wireless Networks

• The IEEE 802.11b standard increased transmission capabilities

to 11 Mbps.
• 802.11b may also be called Wi-Fi™ or high-speed wireless and
refers to DSSS systems that operate at 1, 2, 5.5 and 11 Mbps.
• 802.11b devices achieve the higher data throughput rate by
using a different coding technique from 802.11, allowing for a
greater amount of data to be transferred in the same time
frame.

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 Wireless Networks
• A wireless network may consist of as few as two devices.
• The nodes could simply be desktop workstations or notebook
computers.
• Equipped with wireless NICs, an ‘ad hoc’ network could be
established which compares to a peer-to-peer wired network.
• A problem with this type of network is compatibility.
• Many times NICs from different manufacturers are not
compatible.
• To solve the problem of compatibility, an access point (AP) is
commonly installed to act as a central hub for the WLAN
"infrastructure mode".

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 Wireless Networks

• Performance of the network is affected by signal strength and

degradation in signal quality due to distance or interference.
• As the signal becomes weaker, Adaptive Rate Selection (ARS)
may be invoked.
• The transmitting unit will drop the data rate from 11 Mbps to 5.5
Mbps, from 5.5 Mbps to 2 Mbps or 2 Mbps to 1 Mbps.

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 Wireless Networks

• When a source node sends a frame, the receiving node returns

a positive acknowledgment (ACK).
• This can cause consumption of 50% of the available bandwidth.
• This overhead when combined with the collision avoidance
protocol overhead reduces the actual data throughput to a
maximum of 5.0 to 5.5 Mbps on an 802.11b wireless LAN rated
at 11 Mbps.

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 Wireless Authentication

• WLAN authentication occurs at Layer 2.

• It is the process of authenticating the device not the user.
• The client will send an authentication request frame to the
Access Point (AP) and the frame will be accepted or rejected by
the AP.
• The client is notified of the response via an authentication
response frame.

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 Wireless Authentication

• Authentication and Association types:

– Unauthenticated and unassociated - The node is disconnected
from the network and not associated to an access point.
– Authenticated and unassociated - The node has been
authenticated on the network but has not yet associated with the
access point.
– Authenticated and associated - The node is connected to the
network and able to transmit and receive data through the access
point.

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 Wireless Transmission

• There are three basic ways in which a radio carrier signal can
be modulated.
– Amplitude Modulated (AM) radio stations modulate the height
(amplitude) of the carrier signal.
– Frequency Modulated (FM) radio stations modulate the frequency
of the carrier signal as determined by the electrical signal from the
microphone.
– In WLANs, a third type of modulation called phase modulation is
used to superimpose the data signal onto the carrier signal that is
broadcast by the transmitter.

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