In this Networking 101 class, I walk you through the complete workflow from WAN to LAN in plain language—because church production networks don’t have time for mystery problems on Sunday. I start at the Internet Service Provider (coax or fiber), explain what the modem/ONT actually does (turns that signal into Ethernet), and show why connecting a device straight to the WAN is basically asking for trouble—plus you’re limited by the single public IP you’re paying for. Then I bring in the router as the traffic director: it grabs that public IP on the WAN side and creates your local network on the LAN side, complete with a gateway IP and DHCP handing out addresses to your devices. From there, I show how your network grows in the real world: you run out of LAN ports, so you add a switch, and eventually you build a star topology with multiple switches in key areas instead of trying to home-run 300-foot cables everywhere. Finally, I get into the part that matters for worship tech—why I like isolating a dedicated production network (your own router, access points, and switches) so mission-critical gear stays stable. That’s how I keep systems like ProPresenter control, PTZ camera control, ATEM workflows, and especially Dante happy—because Dante does not play well with other traffic and prefers to be isolated.