How to Subnet a Network

A properly designed subnet can do wonders for the security and performance of a network. The main idea in subnetting is to divide a network into smaller pieces, which we call subnets. Actually implementing a subnet is typically more difficult than simply using the default subnet mask of 255.255.255. 0. This usually means that temporary or smaller networks do not need to be subnetted.

Security sees benefit since the IP addresses of the host computers on each subnet are masked by the network address- which means they are invisible to the outside world. We call this network address translation, or NAT. This same technique helps conserve IP addresses, since all hosts on the subnet essentially just use the network IP address during communication