Workshop

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Part III
The Care and Feeding of Network Appliances
Hour
8 “Hard Basics”: Guide to Being a Hardware Geek
9 Ethernet Basics
10 Token-Ring Basics
11 Windows Networking Basics
12 UNIX Networking Basics
13 NetWare Networking Basics
14 Router and Switch Basics
15 Firewall and Proxy Server Basics
Hour 8
Hard Basics: Guide to Being a Hardware Geek
“We only truly learn by destroying.”
—Usenet post, comp.sys.unix (circa 1980)
Network geeks don’t live in a vacuum; we all have to learn how to deal with the things our networks live
on. Whether it’s a bad circuit board or a corrupt spot on a hard drive, network functions are picky, picky,
picky; they stop working when underlying pieces and parts (the infrastructure) stop working. Networkers
have been fixing (and accidentally breaking) hardware for years. (People may think all we do is stare at
scores of monitors all over our network command center and stroke our beards thoughtfully, but we’ve
really got our sleeves rolled up. We’re the equivalent of a silicon grease monkey.) Once a problem has
been troubleshot down to a hardware component, hardware troubleshooting is often necessary. In this
hour, I’ll cover what to do and what not to do with hardware. I’ll also go over the basics of the following
topics:
• PCs
• Circuit boards and other pluggable electronics
• Cables
• Monitoring system resources