GFK-1852 A-1
IP Addresses
IP Addressing
An IP address is a 32-bit value, divided into four octets of eight bits each. The
standard representation is four decimal numbers (in the range of 0..255), divided by
dots.
Example: 192.2.1.123
This is called decimal-dot notation.
The IP address is divided in two parts: network and host. To support different needs,
three ”network classes” ha ve be en defined. Depending on the network class, the last
one, two or three bytes define th e host, while the remaining part defi nes the network.
In the following, ‘x’ stands for the host part of the IP address:
Class A Network
IP address 1.x.x.x to 127.x.x.x
Only 127 different networks of this class exist. These have a very large number of
potential connected devices (up to 16,777,216)
Example: 10.0.0.1, (network 10, host 0.0.1)
Class B Network
IP address 128.0.x.x to 191.255.xxx.xxx
These networks are used for lar g e company networks. Every network can con sist of
up to 65,534 devices.
Example: 172.1.3.2 (network 172.1, host 3.2)