Network Online Course
Lesson 2 - Communication Standards
Review: Communication Standards
As you look over the material in this chapter, you will see that it concentrates on using
open standards as the basis of modern communications. Review the three sections in the lesson
and these important points.
Section A. Why standards?
It is important to have agreed upon standards because otherwise, communications may not be
possible. Appreciate the difference between proprietary and de jure standards as well as open
and closed. Familiarize yourself with the standards organizations because they are the
sources of many of the specifications you will be learning about in this course.
Section B. The OSI reference model
The OSI Reference model is the basis of modern, open communications and you must understand
the purpose of the model as well as how it works. Make sure you understand the tasks assigned
to each layer, memorize the names of each layer and their order.
Section C. Internetworking devices
Repeaters, bridges, routers and gateways are a good example of the OSI model at work in
practice. Make sure you know the function of each of these internetworking devices and at
which layer of the OSI model they operate at.
Exercise 2-4: Communication Standards Quiz
1. Which of the following examples is a problem with interconnectivity?
a) Using a Token-Ring interface card on an Ethernet network
b) Reading a Word file with WordPerfect
c) Using Novell’s IPX protocol over a TCP/IP network
d) Using a Macintosh drawing program on a IBM PC
2. Which of the following examples is a problem with interoperability?
a) Using a European 220V appliance in North America
b) Mixing 4Mbps and 16Mbps Token-Ring cards in the same ring
c) Transferring a file from an IBM mainframe, which uses the EBCDIC code, to a PC, which
uses ASCII
d) Attaching a serial printer to a parallel port
3. Which one of the following is not an open standards setting body?
a) IBM
b) CCITT
c) ISO
d) ANSI
4. Which one of the following is not a de jure standard?
a) 802.3
b) Driving on the right hand side of the road
c) VHS video tape
d) TCP/IP
5. Which one of the following is not a responsibility of the data link layer?
a) Node addressing
b) Guaranteed delivery of the data
c) Flow control
d) Error detection
6. Repeaters work at the ____________ layer of the OSI model.
a) Session
b) Data-link
c) Network
d) Physical
7. The _________ layer of the OSI model determines the best route for information to take.
a) Data-link
b) Physical
c) Session
d) Network
8. The process by which a header, and optionally, a trailer, is added to data before it is
passed onto the next layer is called
a) Encapsulation
b) Packetizing
c) Packaging
d) Fragmenting
9. One use for a bridge is to
a) Increase performance by localizing traffic to a cable segment
b) Extend the cable length
c) Route traffic through a complex internetwork
d) Translate transportation protocols
10. Which one of the following statements regarding the OSI model is false?
a) Layers in the model must be independent of each other
b) One goal of the model is to allow the easy substitution of components in a network
c) Development of the OSI model was spearheaded by manufacturers who wanted to give consumers
a wide choice in their communication options.
d) A layer must only communicate with the layer above and/or below it
Exercise 2-5: Preparing a hard drive
A network administrator must have basic expertise in hard drive technology. The following is a hands-on
exercise in preparing a hard drive before an operating system is installed. This exercise is
used in a classroom situation, but may also be performed by a student if she has a computer
available.
Preparing a hard drive
In a future exercise, you will be installing an operating system on a clean hard drive. In
this exercise you will prepare a hard drive with the following goals:
- Create a 2GB partition
- Make it Active
- Format it with a FAT16 file system
- Transfer the system files to drive C: and make it bootable
- Boot the computer from drive C: and prove it works
As a system administrator, you need to be familiar with the following topics:
- How to set up/troubleshoot hard drives in ROM BIOS.
- Hard disk structures and concepts including the Master Boot Record (MBR), partitions, the
Active partition and file systems.
- Different file systems particularly FAT16, FAT32 and NTFS.
- How to create partitions and format drives and troubleshoot by using the following MD-DOS
programs,
FDISK
FORMAT
CHKDSK/SCANDISK
DEFRAG
- While working in DOS, you should have some familiarity with the following DOS commands,
DIR
COPY
CD, MD, RD and changing drives
ERASE/DEL
Procedure
1. Before you begin.
- Confirm that the computer is powered down.
- Removable hard drives are fixed firmly in place and locked.
2. Confirm the hard drive in BIOS.
- Power on the computer.
- After you hear a beep, press the DELETE key.
- When the BIOS screen appears, select the first option “Standard BIOS Features”.
- Confirm that a hard drive appears.
- What size is your hard drive? As an alternative, the hard drive may simply be listed as
"Auto" which means automatically detect. The BIOS will automatically detect the hard drive
when the computer boots and therefore no further information is available on this screen.
- Exit BIOS without saving.
3. Boot the computer into MS-DOS.
- Place a bootable DOS floppy diskette in the drive A: and power on the computer.
- The computer should boot without further intervention.
- You should be at the A:> prompt.
4. Create a partition on the hard drive.
- Type FDISK and press ENTER.
- The FDISK program starts up.
- Use option 4 and examine the partition table.
Note: there will be previously created partitions on the hard drive. These must be deleted
first.
- Use the FDISK delete function to delete any partitions.
Warning! Delete partitions in the following order: logical drives, the extended partition and
primary partition.
- Use FDISK to create one 2GB (the maximum size) primary partition.
- Set the primary partition as the active one.
- Exit FDISK and reboot.
5. Format the hard drive and make it bootable.
- Execute the following command
FORMAT C: /S
- Answer any prompts and finish the format.
6. Reboot the computer and prove it works.
- Take the floppy disk out of the drive.
- Restart the computer.
- If the computer boots from drive C: without any error messages, you were successful.
7. Change to drive C:
- Create a directory called “DOS”.
- Copy the contents of the floppy to C:\DOS.
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