Best setup for home network....?

Hi, I'm about to set up my home network. I have BT Infinity with a Draytek Vigor 2750 modem/router and a random managed 8 port gigabit switch.

I'll be connect all of the kids computers to the switch and was wondering if it would be better for me to connect my computer straight to the router or through the switch?

I will be sharing file with the other computers and I want the best ping times possible.

Thoughts?

Thanls

If you're connected to the router you will lose the network when the router reboots.

oh ok, thanks. This is the kind of thing I wanted to find out.

Edited by deleted (Sun 04-Sep-11 15:15:26)

Are you going to replace the OR modem with the Draytek?

You will only loose access to the other PCs for the few seconds it take for the router to reboot. But how often will that happen? Only when you instruct it to.

However, connecting yourself to the switch will keep latency down - but will only save you 0.1 ms or so ... but it is the right way to do it. Leave the modem/router to do what it does best - act as a modem and the switch to do the switching.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Are you going to replace the OR modem with the Draytek?

Yes

In reply to a post by MHC:

You will only loose access to the other PCs for the few seconds it take for the router to reboot. But how often will that happen? Only when you instruct it to.

However, connecting yourself to the switch will keep latency down - but will only save you 0.1 ms or so ... but it is the right way to do it. Leave the modem/router to do what it does best - act as a modem and the switch to do the switching.

Alrite, thanks. Very informative.

But if you have a LAN with dynamic IP's then the PC connected to the router will lose its IP address and any networking in progress will abort.

Edited by deleted (Sun 04-Sep-11 16:08:44)

no the pc wont loose its address with DHCP if the DHCP server stops. It will only loose it at the end of the DHCP lease time, assuming the DHCP server has not come back in that time

Dave

Edit: beaten to the reply by Anon

nope, dynamic IPs are not revoked as soon as the DHCP server goes offline. DHCP leases remain valid for some time, hours days or weeks however you want to set it up.

Only connections that are passing through the router (or accessiing a service on the router) will stop.

If all the PCs are connected to the switch then LAN networking including established connections for sharing files and printers will continue, though some OSes will report the network status as limited if they are polling the default gateway and detect it being down.

Devices that are unlucky to be joining the network while DHCP server is off will assign themselves a link-local (169.254) address, but the OS has the option to can keep trying to contact a DHCP server even after that point.

Edited by prlzx (Sun 04-Sep-11 16:46:30)

As I said, the PC connected to the router.