Introduction to Wide Area Networks

A wide area network (WAN) is a computer network that covers a broad area (i.e., any network
whose communications links cross metropolitan, regional, or national boundaries). This is in
contrast with personal area networks (PANs), local area networks (LANs), campus area networks
(CANs), or metropolitan area networks (MANs) which are usually limited to a room, building,
campus or specific metropolitan area (e.g., a city) respectively. A WAN differs from a LAN is
that while you generally own a LAN infrastructure, you usually lease WAN infrastructure from a
service provider.
Defining WAN Terms
Customer premises equipment (CPE) Equipment that is owned and located at the subscribers
premises.
Demarcation (demarc) The last responsibility of the service provider, usually an RJ-45 jack
located close to the CPE. The CPE at this point would be a CSU/DSU or ISDN interface that
plugs into the demarc.
Local loop Connects the demarc to the closest switching office, called a central office.
Central office (CO) Connects the customers to the providers switching network. A CO is
sometimes referred to as a point of presence (POP).
Toll network Trunk lines inside a WAN providers network. It is a collection of switches and
facilities.
WAN Connection Types
Below figure shows the different WAN connection types that can be used to connect your LANs
(DTE) together over a DCE network.

Leased lines Typically referred to as a point-to-point or dedicated connection. It is a preestablished WAN communications path from the CPE, through the DCE switch, to the CPE of
the remote site, allowing DTE networks to communicate at any time with no setup procedures
before transmitting data. It uses synchronous serial lines up to 45Mbps.
Circuit switching Sets up line like a phone call. No data can transfer before the end-to-end
connection is established. Uses dial-up modems and ISDN. It is used for low-bandwidth data
transfers.
Packet switching WAN switching method that allows you to share bandwidth with other
companies to save money. Think of packet switching networks as a party line. As long as you are
not constantly transmitting data and are instead using bursty data transfers, packet switching can
save you a lot of money. However, if you have constant data transfers, then you will need to get a
leased line. Frame Relay and X.25 are packet switching technologies. Speeds can range from
56Kbps to 2.048Mbps.

WAN Support
Cisco supports HDLC, PPP and Frame Relay on its serial interfaces, and you can see this with
the (encapsulation ?) command from any serial interface.
Corp#config t
Corp(config)#int s0/0/0
Corp(config-if)#encapsulation ?
ATM-dxi
ATM-DXI encapsulation
Frame-relay Frame Relay networks
HDLC
Serial HDLC Synchronous
Lapb
LAPB (X.25 Level 2)
PPP
Point-to-point protocol
SMDS
Switched Megabit Data Service (SMDS)
X25
X.25
Frame Relay
A packet-switched technology that emerged in the early 1990s. Frame Relay is a Data Link and
Physical layer specification that provides high performance. Frame Relay assumes that the
facilities use dare less error prone than when X.25 was used and that they transmit data with less
overhead. Frame Relay is more cost-effective than point-to-point links and can typically run at
speeds of 64Kbps to 1.544Mbps. Frame Relay provides features for dynamic-bandwidth
allocation and congestion control.
ISDN
Integrated Services Digital Network is a set of digital services that transmit voice and data over
existing phone lines. ISDN can offer a cost effective solution for remote users who need a
higher-speed connection than analog dial-up links offer. ISDN is also a good choice as a backup
link for other types of links such as Frame Relay or a T-1 connection.
LAPB
Link Access Procedure, Balanced was created to be used as a connection-oriented protocol at the
Data Link layer for use with X.25. It can also be used as a simple Data Link transport. LAPB has
a tremendous amount of overhead because of its strict timeout and windowing techniques. You
can use LAPB instead of the lower-overhead HDLC if your link is very error prone. However,
that typically is not a problem any longer.
LAPD
Link Access Procedure, D-Channel (LAPD) is used with ISDN at the Data Link Layer (layer 2)
as a protocol for the D (signaling) channel. LAPD was derived from the Link Access Procedure,
Balanced (LAPB) protocol and is designed primarily to satisfy the signaling requirements of
ISDN basic access.
HDLC
High-Level Data Link Control was derived from Synchronous Data Link Control (SDLC), which
was created by IBM as a Data Link connection protocol. HDLC is a connection-oriented
protocol at the Data Link layer, but it has very little overhead compared to LAPB. HDLC was

not intended to encapsulate multiple Network layer protocols across the same link. The HDLC
header carries no identification of the type of protocol being carried inside the HDLC
encapsulation. Because of this, each vendor that uses HDLC has their own way of identifying the
Network layer protocol, which means that each vendors HDLC is proprietary for their
equipment.
PPP
Point-to-Point Protocol is an industry-standard protocol. Because many versions of HDLC are
proprietary, PPP can be used to create point-to-point links between different vendors equipment.
It uses a Network Control Protocol field in the Data Link header to identify the Network layer
protocol. It allows authentication and multilink connections and can be run over asynchronous
and synchronous links.
PPPoE
Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet encapsulates PPP frames in Ethernet frames and is usually
used in conjunction with ADSL services. It gives you a lot of the familiar PPP features like
authentication, encryption, and compression. It has a lower maximum transmission unit MTU
than standard Ethernet does.
Cable
In a modern HFC network, typically 500 to 2,000 active data subscribers are connected to a
certain cable network segment, all sharing the upstream and downstream bandwidth. (Hybrid
fiber-coaxial, or HFC, is a telecommunications industry term for a network that incorporates both
optical fiber and coaxial cable to create a broadband network.
DSL
The connection is setup between a pair of modems on either end of a copper wire that is between
the customer premises equipment (CPE) and the Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer
(DSLAM). A DSLAM is the device located at the providers central office (CO) and concentrates
connections from multiple DSL subscribers.
MPLS
Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) is a data-carrying mechanism that emulates some
properties of a circuit-switched network over a packet-switched network. MPLS is a switching
mechanism that imposes labels (numbers) to packets and then uses those labels to forward
packets. The labels are assigned on the edge of the MPLS of the network, and forwarding inside
the MPLS network is done solely based on labels. Labels usually correspond to a path to layer 3
destination address (equal to IP destination-based routing).
ATM
Asynchronous Transfer Mode was created for time-sensitive traffic, providing simultaneous
transmission of voice, video, and data. ATM uses cells that are fixed 53 bytes long instead of
packets.