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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Router_(computing)

This article is about the network device. For the woodworking tool, see Router (woodworking).

A Cisco ASM/2-32EM router deployed at CERN in 1987

A router^[a] is a networking device that forwards data packets between computer networks. Routers perform the traffic directing functions on the Internet. Data sent through the internet, such as a web page or email, is in the form of data packets. A packet is typically forwarded from one router to another router through the networks that constitute an internetwork until it reaches its destination node.^[2]

A router is connected to two or more data lines from different networks.^[b] When a data packet comes in on one of the lines, the router reads the network address information in the packet to determine the ultimate destination. Then, using information in its routing table or routing policy, it directs the packet to the next network on its journey.

The most familiar type of routers are home and small office routers that simply forward IP packets between the home computers and the Internet. An example of a router would be the owner's cable or DSL router, which connects to the Internet through an Internet service provider (ISP). More sophisticated routers, such as enterprise routers, connect large business or ISP networks up to the powerful core routers that forward data at high speed along the optical fiber lines of the Internet backbone. Though routers are typically dedicated hardware devices, software-based routers also exist.

See also

• Rooter (disambiguation)
• Route (disambiguation)
• Routing (disambiguation)

	Wikibooks has a book on the topic of: Communication Networks/Routing
	Look up router in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
	Wikimedia Commons has media related to Network routers.

• Computer networking portal
• DECbit
• Mobile broadband modem
• Modem
• Residential gateway
• TCAM Content addressable memory (hardware acceleration of route-search)
• Wireless router

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Router

• Router (computing), a computer networking device
• Router (woodworking), a rotating cutting tool

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Routers_(computing)

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` D-Link (3 P)

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` Hardware routers (30 P)

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`Routing software (1 C, 17 P)

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