One of the techie words that you would often come across when you sign up for your home broadband package or business package is IP address or Internet Protocol address. When you get a broadband connection, you are normally offered an IP address so that other PCs in the world wide web network can connect and communicate with your PC (if you are a home user) or your web server (assuming, you are hosting a website on your web space).
Non-technically speaking, IP address is a unique number often assigned to your PC in a network. If you are connected to internet, just check the internet options to go to LAN settings. You would find the IP address of your PC. This address helps other PCs to identify your PC as well as helping your PC to get information from other PCs which have similar unique numbers.
IP addresses are of two types: Dynamic IP and Static IP. What are their features? Why do you get dynamic IP free, why does getting a static IP cost you a bit? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each type?
Remember, when your PC is not connected to internet, it can have any type of IP which is offered by the administrator. Usually, in a LAN network, the IP address of individual PC will be unique and that is the only required in such a network unless the PC is connected to internet.
Dynamic IP
Dynamic IP is usually offered free by all ISPs and this IP will change every time you log on to internet. This means your PC will be assigned different number codes at different times.
Advantages of Dynamic IP
In a network that is administered by Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), the allocation of IP address and network configuration are done much faster.
All the computers (clients) get IP address, DNS, gateway from the DHCP server, automatically. This also makes your task of adding new computers to the network much easier. Regardless of the size of the network, dynamic IP is quite useful as it is easy to allocate, distribute and manage.
In a large LAN network, dynamic IP administration helps you to save your time as you need not configure hundreds of computers manually.
Dynamic IP also helps you to log in as an anonymous user.
The main disadvantage of dynamic IP is that it is not suited to web hosting. You would require static IP then. However, home users will not find any difficulty in using this type of IP.
Static IP
A few broadband providers offer this option which has some distinct advantages. It is a useful feature when you consider web hosting as the server often needs this type of IP address as the DNS will be able to interpret the domain names as IP addresses which never change in the network. Static IP is quite helpful to identify a specific PC in a large network of PCs. Hence, static IP is often used in a large infrastructure environment.
Advantages of Static IP
As static IP never changes in the internet environment, a specific PC can be accessed and controlled and maintained from any place.
For web hosting purposes, static IP is very ideal. If you are a business user and want to promote your business via internet, go for a business broadband package which sometimes may provide you with a free static IP address. Businesses can see better growth and be in touch with their customers when they have their own websites. If you are looking for a cheaper option, find a business package that comes with free static IP and free web space.
Make sure that you pick the right business broadband package after going through the extras provided by the ISPs like free emails, free domain name, webspace etc.
Just think that you can create your own email addresses with your domain name. If your email accounts have some unique identity, they make a huge difference and become an important part of better management of your businesses, it is better to have your own email accounts with your own domain name. It will also help your company to cut a niche among your competitors.
If you are a gamer and use a dedicated broadband connection for that purpose, take a static IP and find the difference. It would definitely help you to have an significant edge over others. This is because the FTP servers make the data transfer much faster.