What is the difference between a router, an access point, a gateway, and a bridge?
Chris’ answer was excellent, but I would like to clarify some things as part of my own answer. Router – Chris’ definition is actually for one kind of router, a Network Address Translation (NAT) router, the kind you can use to share an Internet connection between multiple computers with. A true router simply allows for hosts that are not on the same logical network, like an IP subnet, to communicate with each other. The router receives packets (chunks of data) on an interface and routes them to where they need to go based on a routing table; the table allows the router to have knowledge of where a given logical network is located. The router operates at the network layer (layer 3) of the OSI model. The OSI model separates all of the “under the hood” workings of network communication between two hosts via several layers that represent different functions. Understanding the OSI model is crucial to understanding the difference between routers/gateways and bridges.
Chris’ answer was excellent, but I would like to clarify some things as part of my own answer. Router – Chris’ definition is actually for one kind of router, a Network Address Translation (NAT) router, the kind you can use to share an Internet connection between multiple computers with. A true router simply allows for hosts that are not on the same logical network, like an IP subnet, to communicate with each other. The router receives packets (chunks of data) on an interface and routes them to where they need to go based on a routing table; the table allows the router to have knowledge of where a given logical network is located. The router operates at the network layer (layer 3) of the OSI model. The OSI model separates all of the “under the hood” workings of network communication between two hosts via several layers that represent different functions. Understanding the OSI model is crucial to understanding the difference between routers/gateways and bridges. Gateway – As I said in my
