VPN = Virtual private NetworK. How does it differ from a regular router?

[WayneTeK]

Ok, i'm confused. How does a VPN router differ from a regular router?

Also, how does a wireless router differ from a wireless router that has Wireless Access point???

Any help would be much appreciated!

 

[SarcasticDwarf]

I thought VPN indicated tunneling

or maybe I should shut up and go to sleep

 

[DaveSimmons]

www.practicallynetworked.com or google has answers if no one here feels like doing the typing. Nap time for me

 

[AnyMal]

Wireless AP - is just that, an access point. It has no routing or switching function

VPN - provides secure point-to-point connection via encrypted tunnell and utilizes PPTP protocol.

Regular router - simply a gateway from your internal network to outside (Internet). Most likely uses NAT to mask your public IP address from internal network.

 

[leung324]

played with VPN once...it was fun

 

[kami333]

VPN router will act as the VPN endpoint, with a regular router all it will do is passthrough so you need to run the VPN on your server.

 

[WayneTeK]

Ok, can somebody please explain this to me in dummy language?? i'm hella confused.

 

[Zugzwang152]

Originally posted by: WayneTeK
Ok, can somebody please explain this to me in dummy language?? i'm hella confused.

then use google.

 

[Ameesh]

Originally posted by: WayneTeK
Ok, can somebody please explain this to me in dummy language?? i'm hella confused.

very simply put a VPN provides authentication and usually some form of encryption for your network connection.

basically it means that when i talk to you, you can verify that you are talking to me and vice versa and there is some way we can exchange keys (either symetric or non-symetric) so that we can encrypt the traffic to ensure the confidentiality of the traffic.

many vpns use the underlying L2TP/IPSec protocols to establish a vpn connection. L2TP provides a tunnnel for the network traffic and IPSec provides for the encryption over that tunnel.

 

[kami333]

And then (depending on how it is setup) you can access files SECURELY as if you were on the same network, ie if your company had a VPN setup you could access your work files just as if you were in the office. For schools you could also have access to stuff like online databases and journals that your school subscribes to, just as if you were in the library looking up the same stuff.

Comes in handy.