There are two ways of sharing your broadband connection.
Setup Internet connection sharing on your PC. This is achieved through your operating system or through specialist software. The problem with this approach is that your computer needs to be on for the other computers to access the internet. You also have to manually setup unique addresses for each computer on your network.
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Setup Internet connection sharing using a router. As you can see in the diagram below, the router connects directly to your broadband point. On the back of the router (depending on what you buy) are points to connect to computers through a physical connection or through radio wireless connection. Software is installed on each PC to prevent Viruses and hackers getting into your system. The router has your 'logon' credentials stored so that if there is a problem, it can automatically log back in to your service provider. The router also takes care of making sure that all the computers have an unique address on the network. This is necessary so that all the computers can talk to each other and the internet at the same time.
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