[SOLVED] Local Area Network via Switch for Sharing and LAN Gaming?

[uzi314]

Hi guys!
I wanna know that how can I make Local Area Network via only switch instead of router because I don't want internet for sharing my files and folders and for LAN Gaming and please note that I will be using Gigabit switch thus I want full 1 Gbps speed on sharing but IDK about the whole process as this will be the unmanaged switch(Plug n Play) so will this be simple or will I have to do some networt settings like manually assigning ips or it will be automatically done and I will get 1 Gbps speed on sharing and will be able to play games with friends on the network?

Equipment:

Switch:
TP-Link Gigabit 8 Port Desktop Switch
PC:
4xModern Desktop PCs with Windows 10 PRO with NICs capable of up to 1 Gbps

 

[Lutfij]

If you connect the switch to the router, you're going to grant access to the PC's to the www. You're going to have to mention the make and model of the router. You could perhaps set an option to prevent a PC from going to the www from a predetermined time frame.

 

[bill001g]

You will have to manually assign all the IP to make it work. Other than that you hook it to the switch and it works.

If you only have 4 pc I would recommend you buy the cheapest possible router you can find that has gigabit lan ports. You would then use it the same as a swtich but the router has the DHCP function so you do not have to assign IP manually. As long as you do not plug the wan port into anything the machines are completely isolated from the internet.

You could also use the 8 port gigabit switch and then find any router out of any junk pile and hook one of its lan ports to the switch. All you are using it for is a dhcp server so it does not matter if it is only 100mbps.

 

[jsmithepa]

While you don't need a router for what you want, but in every LAN, a router is necessary for other functions. For one a router provides the IP address to all clients. U may already have a router and don't know it.

 

[BFG-9000]

Just use a gigabit router and don't connect anything to the WAN port. It will still hand out IP addresses via DHCP but have no internet connection.

As said, using just a gigabit switch requires setting a fixed IP address on each computer--which may need to be undone each time you want to reconnect them to other networks, a real hassle if people are bringing their own desktops over.

 

[uzi314]

You will have to manually assign all the IP to make it work. Other than that you hook it to the switch and it works.

If you only have 4 pc I would recommend you buy the cheapest possible router you can find that has gigabit lan ports. You would then use it the same as a swtich but the router has the DHCP function so you do not have to assign IP manually. As long as you do not plug the wan port into anything the machines are completely isolated from the internet.

You could also use the 8 port gigabit switch and then find any router out of any junk pile and hook one of its lan ports to the switch. All you are using it for is a dhcp server so it does not matter if it is only 100mbps.

Hey thanks for the reply @bill00g! Can you confirm just one more thing that I know if I transfer from 1 PC to another PC via this Gigabit Switch I will get 1Gbps speed but if I transfer data from 1 PC to multiple PCs like the rest of the 3 simultaneously so will I also get 1Gbps speed on each 3 of them or the speed of 1Gbps of the switch will be divided into 3 of them? OR Will I have to make another thread for it?

 

[uzi314]

Just use a gigabit router and don't connect anything to the WAN port. It will still hand out IP addresses via DHCP but have no internet connection.

As said, using just a gigabit switch requires setting a fixed IP address on each computer--which may need to be undone each time you want to reconnect them to other networks, a real hassle if people are bringing their own desktops over.

Hey thanks for the reply BFG-9000! I already have a 100Mbps router with its own 100Mbps Switch and I'm using a 4Mbps internet connection which is not even near a 100Mbps connection but I needed another Gigabit Switch only to share data on LAN with 1Gbps speed among my computers which 100Mbps Switch couldn't do and as for the assigning IPs which you say need to be undone when I would connect to other network which is of course an internet so can't I use something like LAN port splitter for connecting two ethernet cables and somehow also make another adapter in Network and Sharing>Change Adapter Settings or will I have to use 2 Port Ethernet PCIe Card/adapter which I'm not planning to use due to my Mobo has few slots which I have already in use?

 

[bill001g]

The bottleneck is not the switch in that case....well it sorta is. The pc can only put a total of 1gbit into the switch because that is all the faster the port is. That 1gbit can go to a single machine or be split between other machines. Even though the ports connected to the other machines can run more data the sending machine has no ability to put more traffic into the switch.

Now you could also transfer files between the other machines at the same time they were receiving data from the primary machine.

This tends to be more theoretical question since it is very hard to actually put out a gigabit of traffic and most game type of traffic is only using maybe 1mbps. It would be different if you were running something like video rendering servers.

 

[failboat]

Hey thanks for the reply @bill00g! Can you confirm just one more thing that I know if I transfer from 1 PC to another PC via this Gigabit Switch I will get 1Gbps speed but if I transfer data from 1 PC to multiple PCs like the rest of the 3 simultaneously so will I also get 1Gbps speed on each 3 of them or the speed of 1Gbps of the switch will be divided into 3 of them? OR Will I have to make another thread for it?

Not with a simple file share in windows. a program could do something like this with multicast, but that's not going to be a simple thing. if you're trying to send 100s of GB of game files to dozens of computers a local bitorrent would actually be worth trying to setup.

 

[uzi314]

The bottleneck is not the switch in that case....well it sorta is. The pc can only put a total of 1gbit into the switch because that is all the faster the port is. That 1gbit can go to a single machine or be split between other machines. Even though the ports connected to the other machines can run more data the sending machine has no ability to put more traffic into the switch.

Now you could also transfer files between the other machines at the same time they were receiving data from the primary machine.

This tends to be more theoretical question since it is very hard to actually put out a gigabit of traffic and most game type of traffic is only using maybe 1mbps. It would be different if you were running something like video rendering servers.

I got it! A lot of thanks @bill001g!