Market research shows that current PC owners are buying most of the new computers that are sold each year. This means that multi-computer households are becoming very common. If you are one these multiple-PC owners, you have probably thought about how great it would be if your computers could talk to each other.

Modern university students use networks for everything from class research to online games. Often students may have more than one computer, or may be sharing an Internet connection with their roommates. Some students even throw LAN parties and play games across a network long into the night.

There are many benefits to connecting your computers with a network, which include, but are not limited to:

• Share a single printer between computers
• Use a single Internet connection, or IP address
• Share hard drive space and files such as images, MP3's, movies, and documents
• Play games that allow multiple users at different computers
• Send the output of a device like a DVD player or Webcam to your other computer(s)

When you decide to install a home network, there are a few steps that every single person will have to consider before they will be able to reap the benefits. These steps are:

1. Choose the technology you will use for the network; this should reflect your current topology (network layout), and also allow for your network to grow to fit your future needs. The main technologies to choose between are standard Ethernet, phone-line-based, power-line-based, and wireless. There are other technologies that exist, such as Token Ring and FDDI, but they are not recommended for use in a home network unless you already have extensive experience with that particular technology.
2. Buy and install the hardware.
3. Configure the system and get everything talking together correctly.