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Office Network Design Case Study — Raffles Place
Case Study: A small trading business has engaged you to design and implement an office network for a new office comprising HR Personal (3), sales consultants (4) Digital Marketing (5) and accounting executives (5). The new office is to be located at raffles place. The HR executives are responsible for staff recruitments for the main office at Bugis, the consultants are responsible for job placements and the accounting function is relocated from the current location at Bugis. The new office will not exceed 30 personnel in the foreseeable future.
The network director has provided the following information and is open to recommendations for additional server/network components if required:
- One Domain server: this is the network domain controller where the active directory services are installed.
- One DNS and DHCP server: this server will provide both the DNS and DHCP services.
- Email services are to be outsourced.
- The network IP address to be used is 10.64.136.106/25.
In the context of the case study, please complete the following tasks:
i) Briefly discuss and justify the various transmission media that you would consider for the network at the new office. Include in the discussion why you have not considered the other media types. ( 10 marks)
ii) Identify and justify other networking devices (routers, switches, firewall etc) that you would need to setup the network. (15 marks)
iii) Compute the network IP address, the first assignable IP address, the last assignable IP address, the broadcast IP address, and the range of assignable IP address. (15 marks)
iv) Describe why the DNS service is important and how the DNS services are to be deployed in the network. ( 10 marks)
v) Discuss any five (5) threats faced by computer network users and what strategies might be used to prevent each of them from happening. (50 marks)
Conduct library / Internet research on the typical operations of your chosen organisation and use the information gathered to write a report. Your report must answer the following questions / sections and include all factors stated below. Each of the points in the table below must be reproduced into your answer. You must use terms found within this subject. You are encouraged to look up various textbooks and journals to find these terms and to gain additional knowledge on this subject through exploration. You may need to do independent research and learning if topics are not yet covered.
| S/N | Description | Words |
| 1 | Briefly discuss and justify the various transmission media. | 400 |
| 2 | Explain the functions of each of the following components: Bridge, Router, Switch, firewall and Hub. | 400 |
| 3 | Compute the network IP address, the first assignable IP address, the last assignable IP address, the broadcast IP address, and the range of assignable IP address. | 100 |
| 4 | Describe why the DNS service is important and how the DNS services are to be deployed in the network. | 100 |
| 5 | Explain any five threats faced by computer network users/ threats to data security and strategies that users may take to address these threats. | 1000 |
| Total approx. no. of words | 2000 |
You are required to consult and fully reference a MINIMUM of 6 references from 3 different sources of information (e.g., book; www; journal article from the full-text databases; current affairs magazine; newspaper etc.). The use of WIKIPEDIA online encyclopaedia is NOT allowed. You must use the APA Referencing system to acknowledge your sources of information (both in-text, and as a reference list at the end).
Expert Answers on Above Questions on Computer Networking
Transmission media
The primary transmission medium that is effective in the given case of the new office network at Raffles Place is Unshielded Twisted Pair Cat6 Ethernet Cabling. It is quite effective because it provides bandwidth of 1 Gbps, and the cost of installation and maintenance is very low. In addition to this, this infrastructure is good enough for different departments including HR, Sales, digital marketing and accounting, as they rely on reliable local connectivity. Fibre optic cabling can also be used to connect the main switch to the server room and it can provide large transfers easily. Secondary medium that can be used for mobility is wireless wi-fi 6 as it is quite useful in supporting laptops, mobile devices and meeting room connectivity.
Media types not chosen and justification
The media types that are not considered include coaxial cable, shielded twisted pair (STP) and satellite or microwave links. The coaxial cable is outdated, and STP is not essential as it is highly expensive, and satellite or microwave links are ineffective for indoor LAN networks.
Networking devices
In order to develop a networking infrastructure, the important devices that are required include a router, switches, firewall, wireless access points and a bridge/hub.
IP address computation
The IP address computation includes the consideration for network address, broadcast address, first assignable IP, last assignable IP and usable range.
Importance and deployment of DNS
DNS is mainly responsible for translating the domain names into IP addresses, and as a result of this, it is possible to access websites and servers without the numeric IPs. In the office, the DNS server will run internally and host local domain records. It is responsible for forwarding the external DNS queries to the ISP, and ensures consistency with active directory.
5 threats and preventive strategies
The five Threads can be in the form of Malware, phishing and social engineering, network intrusions and hacking, denial of service attacks and insider threads. To deal with these above issues, the preventive strategies include updating antivirus, email filtering, restricted downloads, staff training, anti-phishing filters, firewall, traffic monitoring, audit logs and security awareness.
| Disclaimer: This answer is a model for study and reference purposes only. Please do not submit it as your own work. |
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