Wide Area Network architecture

[soosoo-00]

Hello,

I want to ask: Can we build a Wide Area Network (WAN) that connects multiple LANs in a star topology where the connection between the central location (the Hub) and each LAN is a direct link? How can this be achieved?

Also, what is the difference between public and private Wide Area Networks?

[vmiller]

It is fairly common topology, also known as hub and spoke.

There are any number of ways to accomplish this.

Private Network. You order and provision physical circuits from carriers to your sites and homed back to your central site.

you can use dedicated poit to point or frame relay for the links.

a public wan would be carrier provided backbone routing over mpls. You "share" that with other clients, but only see your traffic. Internet based vpns, where each location has a link to the internet and uses that as transport is another option.

[soosoo-00]

Thank you very much, that's helpful.

You mean that I can have a direct link (ex: dedicated point to point or frame relay for the link) between each LAN as a whole and the hub?

The problem is that I need to design a wide area network that connects mutiple buildings across a multiple cities based on the star topology. And I need a high degree of security, privacy, reliability and fast delivery of data between the buildings and the hub. If I put a dedicated point-to-point or a frame relay link between each building (LAN) and the hub, will this acheive these goals?

Regarding the private and public WAN, I understood that the difference is in the ownership or the provision of the physical cuircuits. In public WANs I share them with other clients and in private WANs there is no sharing of circuits. Does this mean that private WANs provide higher degree of security, privacy, reliability and faster delivery of data?

[ebarticel]

Public WAN is also refered to as the Internet, while Private WANs are all other connections, like farme-relay, ISDN, ATM and others

[vmiller · Accepted solution]

1. yes, your constraints are money, and interfaces.

2. Given those requrements, I would suggest looking at a layer-3 vpn (MPLS).

     you can enhance your security by encrypting your traffic, and save some money & pain by avoiding the point to point

      solution.

  3. The "higher security" of an all private solution versus a semi public one could be debated. As far as reliability its a toss up, and capacity is all about what you are willing to pay for, many carriers have a customer backbone that run at OC-x speeds, with a well thought out qos scheme, you can optimize your flows to meet the carriers design. 

[soosoo-00]

Thank you very much