CHAPTER 3
SUBNETTING A NETWORK
A sub network or subnet is a logical subdivision of an IP network. The practice of dividing
a network into two or more networks is called sub netting.
Sub netting offers many advantages. Some of them are.
1. It provides security to the network.
2. Speeds up the network thus improving the performance of the network.
3. It allows for better organization of the resources.
Imagine a small company whose network looks like below. It has one Java Developer (JD), one
software tester, one HR personnel and one network administrator. If it is assigned the IP address
range from 192.168.10.1 to 192.168.10.255.
DHCP is enabled on the router as below.
Enable DHCP on all PCs:
After one year, the company has grown to three Java Developers, three software testers and a
dedicated HR team. It also has moved into Remote Infrastructure Management( RIM) and has a
Network Operation Center (NOC) and Security Operation Center (SOC). There are 15 computers
in the network which looks like below.
On the image below, the machine “JD1” sends a packet to machine “Testing3”. We can see
here that for communication between machines “JD1: and “Testing3” other machines have also
been disturbed. This affects the performance of the network.
For this reason, we should subnet the network. It may be divided into three subnets as shown
below, each for HR, Java Development and OC departments.
To create a subnet, we need to have proper planning as to how many subnets we need and how
many we may need in the future. Presently, we need three subnets. The number of subnets
should always be calculated in the powers of 2.
2 to the power of 1 = 2
This doesn’t satisfy our requirement as we need three subnets.
2 to the power of 2 = 4
This satisfies our requirement. So we need to take two bits from the host portion of the IP
address. 192.168.10.1 to 192.168.10.255 is the address range available to us with subnet mask
255.255.255.0, Writing the subnet mask in the binary notation, it is
11111111 11111111 11111111 00000000
255 255 255 0
The first 24 bits are network bits and the last eight bits are host bits. To create three subnets, we
need to take two bits from the host portion of the address as explained above.
11111111 111111111 11111111 11000000
255 255 255 192
Four subnets which can be created from the above subnet mask are,
192.168.10.0 to 192.168.10.63 ( with host bits 00000000 )
192.168.10.64 to 192.168.10.127 ( with host bits 01000000 )
192.168.10.128 to 192.168.10.191 ( with host bits 10000000 )
192.168.10.192 to 192.168.10.255 ( with host bits 11000000 )
Since we require only three subnets, we will create the first three subnets. The first subnet (
192.168.10.1 to 192.168.10.63 ) comprises of Java Developers and Software testers. The
commands are as shown below on the interface.
Router(config)#int fa 0/0
Router(config-if)#ip add 192.168.10.1 255.255.255.192
Router(config-if)#no shut
Router(config-if)#ip dhcp pool net1
Router(dhcp-config)#network 192.168.10.0 255.255.255.192
Router(dhcp-config)#dns-server 192.168.10.1
Router(dhcp-config)#default-router 192.168.10.1
Router(dhcp-config)#exit
If you go to any machine on this subnet and look at its IP address, it will be like below.
Now the subnet for the Human Resource Department ( 192.168.10.128 to 192.168.10.191 ) .
This will be like below.
Router(config)#int fa 1/0
Router(config-if)#ip add 192.168.10.129 255.255.255.192
Router(config-if)#no shut
Router(config-if)#ip dhcp pool net2
Router(dhcp-config)#network 192.168.10.128 255.255.255.192
Router(dhcp-config)#dns-server 192.168.10.129
Router(dhcp-config)#default-router 192.168.10.129
Router(dhcp-config)#exit
The third subnet (192.168.10.64 to 192.168.10.127) comprises of NOC and SOC.
Router(config)#int fa 0/1
Router(config-if)#ip add 192.168.10.65 255.255.255.192
Router(config-if)#no shut
Router(config-if)#ip dhcp pool net3
Router(dhcp-config)#network 192.168.10.64 255.255.255.192
Router(dhcp-config)#dns-server 192.168.10.65
Router(dhcp-config)#default-router 192.168.10.65
Router(dhcp-config)#exit
Now our network has been successfully subnetted into three subnets and we still have another
subnet to use for future use.
