I think you are over complicating what a network is Glug.Picture...

I think you are over complicating what a network is Glug.

Picture a home network which caters for every room in a house, and in a couple of rooms you have another switch catering for multiple terminals, then scale it up.

Each point of distribution could be called an exchange, hub, node, switch, router, in simple terms they are just distribution points.

As long as the equipment at a distribution point and the cable connection to the next distribution point can handle the volume/load, it'll work fine. Any bottle necks in the system will however cause problems.

The chances of Home use creating a bottle neck on a dedicated line to the first distribution point from the home is remote unless one is running a serious graphics business or the like, in which case they can fund their own extra bandwidth.

When I say serious graphics business I mean beyond 10s of GB daily.

I don't know what HotCopper's daily usage is, but I doubt it is 1 gig per day and how many people use it daily.