How To Fix A Physically Broken Hard Drive?

  If it's an inconvenience when your system crashes, it's a disaster when your hard drive heads south. Usually, that means your data is destroyed and your bits are blasted—unless you backed up, of course. But is your drive really dead, or just mostly dead? We'll show you how you might recover something, but be warned: this information is provided for use at your own risk and should only be used if the data on your drive is not worth the money to INVEST in professional repair. If the data means anything to you -- if you need it for your work or for legal purposes -- DO NOT USE THIS METHOD. If your the next step is to throw away or otherwise recycle a really dead hard drive, then proceed at your own risk!

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   Verify the failure. Make sure your drive is truly broken by checking things that could cause your drive to not be recognized.

   • If your drive is making a steady, loud clicking noise, stop and skip to part two. Your drive is dead.

   
   
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      Check hardware connections. This is the best place to start, and if found to be the problem, is the fastest, most inexpensive fix you can make!

      • Make sure power is getting to the computer. If the cat knocked out the plug, or cable is broken, nothing will work.
      • Open up the computer case. Are the data (IDE or SATA) and power cables firmly in place? Make sure they are seated well, and no pins are bent, broken, or otherwise damaged.
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      Do a visual check. Sometimes, it's not the drive that's dead, but the PC board that controls its operation (on the underside of the drive). If there's a power surge, or a component failure on that board, your drive will stop working, but only because it doesn't know what to do next.

      • Look for signs of damage—burns or scorch marks. If you see this, you can breathe a little sigh of relief, for it means that is your likely culprit—and often times, this is a problem that can be fixed with relative ease.
      • If you want to replace the PCB, search on Google for replacement parts for your drive's make and model.
      • When it arrives, remove the old board (there are five tiny screws to remove—don't lose them!)
      • Slide out the old drive, and replace it with the new one. Do not touch the metal leads on the new board—static discharge could blow your new board before it ever has a chance to breath new life into your drive. You can ground yourself by either wearing an anti-static wrist band, or by touching something grounded and metal. The inside of your plugged-in computer will usually work.
      • Slide in the new board, making sure it's seated firmly into the drive, then re-attach the screws.
      • Reconnect the drive to the computer, then power back up. If it works, congratulations! It's a good idea to back up your data at this point, but you're good to go.
      • If it doesn't work—keep reading.
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      Check to see if the drive is being recognized. If everything is plugged in, and nothing appears to have blown up on the controller PCB, check out Windows Disk Management or BIOS, or Mac OS X Disk Utility to determine if your drive is being recognized at all.

   Part 2 of 4: Options for Repair

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      Make a choice: if this data is worth saving, it is worth finding a professional hard-drive recovery company and paying what it takes to get your data back. If you attempt anything at all yourself, chances of recovering any data professionally will be nil.
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      A quick search on Google for "hard drive replacement parts" will lead you in a couple different directions. Replacing parts may work for older hard drives, but usually not for newer ones.
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      Do it yourself. A favorite method of brave souls is the DIY method, promoted by companies that specialize in providing parts for do-It-yourselves. The idea is that if you simply replace the burned out controller board, your drive will spring back to life.

      • Truth is, maybe it will! But there's one big caveat: the chips on the controller are, more and more, calibrated for that particular drive, and there's no guarantee a replacement will work. However, this is by far the least-expensive option.
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      Hire a professional. This is the ONLY OPTION to get your drive back up and running, or at least have the files on the drive recovered (which is really what you want, in the end).

      • Turnaround times can be quicker than the DIY method, and success is somewhat more assured, but it comes at a cost, which may be worth it if your data is important.
      • You can expect to pay two or three times more than the original cost of the drive, so you will have to weigh the value of the money against the value of the data on the drive.

   Part 3 of 4: Do It Yourself

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      Read this first! If your drive made a clicking sound the first time you plugged it in, any time you plug it in again causes loss of data by damaging the magnetic layer on the drive. Do not attempt this self repair if the data is important to you for work or legal reasons. Some of these techniques are "Hail Mary" attempts that will either work orrender your drive truly, finally, really dead. This will totally and finally kill any part of data that is not already damaged.
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      Physically test the drive. Hold the drive in one hand and firmly spin it back and forth, listening for any noises as you do so. This may seem like "not doing anything" but actually if anything is loose, you may cause it to break!!! If you can't hear any noises, a likely cause—especially if you have an older drive, or one which ran very hot to the touch—is a seized head bearing or spindle. The following steps can be considered: If you open up the drive you are likely to kill whatever was still able to be saved.
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      Warm it up. Pre-heat a domestic oven at its lowest setting for five minutes or so, then turn it off. Place the drive in the oven for 2-5 mins, until it's warmed up. Please note that warming it up -- whether it has already crashed or not -- can and will make it die.

      • Remove the drive and repeat the first step. If you still can't hear any noises, go on to the next step. However, if there is a difference, reattach the drive to your computer and listen for spin-up of the drive and normal clicking that indicates head activity. If all seems well so far, try to access the drive, and move your data onto a good drive.
      • If needed, reheat the device and, whilst holding the drive in one hand, sharply spin and hit the drive on a hard surface. This is drastic of course, but may help free the heads from any binding. If anything was still alive on your hard drive, it will now be totally and finally dead.
      • Repeat the first step. Can you hear head movement now? If yes, re-attach the drive to your computer, and try accessing the drive.
      • If you can hear a rhythmic "click" in time with the movement, the chances are that the drive heads are free on their mounts and are not jammed. Check that you don't hear any rattling noises when you rotate the drive gently (back and forth) through 90 degrees. This would indicate loose and disconnected components inside the drive and are beyond the scope or intent of this article.
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      Chill it down. Another option—a controversial one—is freezing the drive. This is a last-ditch effort, and you may only get the drive back long enough to copy off important files, but if all else fails, it's worth a try.

      • Seal the drive in a zip-lock bag, and remove as much air as possible. Pop the drive into the freezer for a few hours.
      • Plug the drive back into the computer, and give it a try. If it doesn't work immediately, power down, remove the drive, then smack it on a hard surface such as a table or floor. Re-attach the drive, and try again. If it works, save your files, then toss the drive. If it doesn't, your drive will now be beyond all methods of professional help!!
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      Get recommendations. There are many companies out there that will offer to repair your drive for a (not so small) fee. Before plunking down any cash, check their credentials. Look at online user forums, talk to them, and find out how long they've been in business and what there recovery percentage is.

      • Check their guarantee, and how much they charge for both success (which you will gladly pay for) or for failure. How much is it worth to you for them to make a failed attempt.
      • You may not want to pay for a recovery that didn't happen, but if they attempted repair and if failed, they still spent some amount of time trying, which should be compensated.

How To Crimp And Connect A Network Cable, Step By Step.

The steps below are general Ethernet Category 5 (commonly known as Cat 5) cable construction guidelines. For our example, we will be making a Category 5e patch cable, but the same general method will work for making any category of network cables.

STEPS.

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   Unroll the required length of network cable and add a little extra wire, just in case. If a boot is to be fitted, do so before stripping away the sleeve and ensure the boot faces the correct way.

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   Carefully remove the outer jacket of the cable. Be careful when stripping the jacket as to not nick or cut the internal wiring. One good way to do this is to cut lengthwise with snips or a knife along the side of the cable, away from yourself, about an inch toward the open end. This reduces the risk of nicking the wires' insulation. Locate the string inside with the wires, or if no string is found, use the wires themselves to unzip the sheath of the cable by holding the sheath in one hand and pulling sideways with the string or wire. Cut away the unzipped sheath and cut the twisted pairs about 1 1/4" (30 mm). You will notice 8 wires twisted in 4 pairs. Each pair will have one wire of a certain color and another wire that is white with a colored stripe matching its partner (this wire is called a tracer).
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   Inspect the newly revealed wires for any cuts or scrapes that expose the copper wire inside. If you have breached the protective sheath of any wire, you will need to cut the entire segment of wires off and start over at step one. Exposed copper wire will lead to cross-talk, poor performance or no connectivity at all. It is important that the jacket for all network cables remains intact.
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   Untwist the pairs so they will lay flat between your fingers. The white piece of thread can be cut off even with the jacket and disposed (see Warnings). For easier handling, cut the wires so that they are 3/4" (19 mm) long from the base of the jacket and even in length.
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   Arrange the wires based on the wiring specifications you are following. There are two methods set by the TIA, 568A and 568B. Which one you use will depend on what is being connected. A straight-through cable is used to connect two different-layer devices (e.g. a hub and a PC). Two like devices normally require a cross-over cable. The difference between the two is that a straight-through cable has both ends wired identically with 568B, while a cross-over cable has one end wired 568A and the other end wired 568B.^[1] For our demonstration in the following steps, we will use 568B, but the instructions can easily be adapted to 568A.

   • 568B - Put the wires in the following order, from left to right:
     
     • white orange
     • orange
     • white green
     • blue
     • white blue
     • brown
     • white brown
     • green
   • 568A - from left to right:
     
     • white/green
     • green
     • white/orange
     • blue
     • white/blue
     • orange
     • white/brown
     • brown
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   You can also use the mnemonic 1-2-3-6/3-6-1-2 to remember which wires are switched.
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   Press all the wires flat and parallel between your thumb and forefinger. Verify the colors have remained in the correct order. Cut the top of the wires even with one another so that they are 1/2" (12.5 mm) long from the base of the jacket, as the jacket needs to go into the 8P8C connector by about 1/8", meaning that you only have a 1/2" of room for the individual cables. Leaving more than 1/2" untwisted can jeopardize connectivity and quality. Ensure that the cut leaves the wires even and clean; failure to do so may cause the wire not to make contact inside the jack and could lead to wrongly guided cores inside the plug.
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   Keep the wires flat and in order as you push them into the RJ-45 plug with the flat surface of the plug on top. The white/orange wire should be on the left if you're looking down at the jack. You can tell if all the wires made it into the jack and maintain their positions by looking head-on at the plug. You should be able to see a wire located in each hole, as seen at the bottom right. You may have to use a little effort to push the pairs firmly into the plug. The cabling jacket should also enter the rear of the jack about 1/4" (6 mm) to help secure the cable once the plug is crimped. You may need to stretch the sleeve to the proper length. Verify that the sequence is still correct before crimping.
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   Place the wired plug into the crimping tool. Give the handle a firm squeeze. You should hear a ratcheting noise as you continue. Once you have completed the crimp, the handle will reset to the open position. To ensure all pins are set, some prefer to double-crimp by repeating this step.
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   Repeat all of the above steps with the other end of the cable.The way you wire the other end (568A or 568B) will depend on whether you're making a straight-through, rollover, or cross-over cable (see Tips).
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    Test the cable to ensure that it will function in the field. Mis-wired and incomplete network cables could lead to headaches down the road. In addition, with power-over-Ethernet (PoE) making its way into the marketplace, crossed wire pairs could lead to physical damage of computers or phone system equipment, making it even more crucial that the pairs are in the correct order. A simple cable tester can quickly verify that information for you. Should you not have a network cable tester on hand, simply test connectivity pin to pin.

What Is An IP Address?

Every machine on a network has a unique identifier. Just as you would address a letter to send in the mail, computers use the unique identifier to send data to specific computers on a network. Most networks today, including all computers on the Internet, use the TCP/IP protocol as the standard for how to communicate on the network. In the TCP/IP protocol, the unique identifier for a computer is called its IP address.

There are two standards for IP addresses: IP Version 4 (IPv4) and IP Version 6 (IPv6). All computers with IP addresses have an IPv4 address, and many are starting to use the new IPv6 address system as well. Here's what these two address types mean:

• IPv4 uses 32 binary bits to create a single unique address on the network. An IPv4 address is expressed by four numbers separated by dots. Each number is the decimal (base-10) representation for an eight-digit binary (base-2) number, also called an octet. For example: 216.27.61.137
• IPv6 uses 128 binary bits to create a single unique address on the network. An IPv6 address is expressed by eight groups of hexadecimal (base-16) numbers separated by colons, as in 2001:cdba:0000:0000:0000:0000:3257:9652. Groups of numbers that contain all zeros are often omitted to save space, leaving a colon separator to mark the gap (as in 2001:cdba::3257:9652).

At the dawn of IPv4 addressing, the Internet was not the large commercial sensation it is today, and most networks were private and closed off from other networks around the world. When the Internet exploded, having only 32 bits to identify a unique Internet address caused people to panic that we'd run out of IP addresses. Under IPv4, there are 232 possible combinations, which offers just under 4.3 billion unique addresses. IPv6 raised that to a panic-relieving 2128 possible addresses. Later, we'll take a closer look at how to understand your computer's IPv4 or IPv6 addresses.

How does your computer get its IP address? An IP address can be either dynamic or static. A static address is one that you configure yourself by editing your computer's network settings. This type of address is rare, and it can create network issues if you use it without a good understanding of TCP/IP. Dynamic addresses are the most common. They're assigned by the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), a service running on the network. DHCP typically runs on network hardware such asrouters or dedicated DHCP servers.

Dynamic IP addresses are issued using a leasing system, meaning that the IP address is only active for a limited time. If the lease expires, the computer will automatically request a new lease. Sometimes, this means the computer will get a new IP address, too, especially if the computer was unplugged from the network between leases. This process is usually transparent to the user unless the computer warns about an IP address conflict on the network (two computers with the same IP address). An address conflict is rare, and today's technology typically fixes the problem automatically.

Next, let's take a closer look at the important parts of an IP address and the special roles of certain addresses.

IP Classes.

Earlier, you read that IPv4 addresses represent four eight-digit binary numbers. That means that each number could be 00000000 to 11111111 in binary, or 0 to 255 in decimal (base-10). In other words, 0.0.0.0 to 255.255.255.255. However, some numbers in that range are reserved for specific purposes on TCP/IP networks. These reservations are recognized by the authority on TCP/IP addressing, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). Four specific reservations include the following:

• 0.0.0.0 -- This represents the default network, which is the abstract concept of just being connected to a TCP/IP network.
• 255.255.255.255 -- This address is reserved for network broadcasts, or messages that should go to all computers on the network.
• 127.0.0.1 -- This is called the loopback address, meaning your computer's way of identifying itself, whether or not it has an assigned IP address.
• 169.254.0.1 to 169.254.255.254 -- This is the Automatic Private IP Addressing (APIPA) range of addresses assigned automatically when a computer's unsuccessful getting an address from a DHCP server.

The other IP address reservations are for subnet classes. A subnet is a smaller network of computers connected to a larger network through a router. The subnet can have its own address system so computers on the same subnet can communicate quickly without sending data across the larger network. A router on a TCP/IP network, including the Internet, is configured to recognize one or more subnets and route network traffic appropriately. The following are the IP addresses reserved for subnets:

• 10.0.0.0 to 10.255.255.255 -- This falls within the Class A address range of 1.0.0.0 to 127.0.0.0, in which the first bit is 0.
• 172.16.0.0 to 172.31.255.255 -- This falls within the Class B address range of 128.0.0.0 to 191.255.0.0, in which the first two bits are 10.
• 192.168.0.0 to 192.168.255.255 -- This falls within the Class C range of 192.0.0.0 through 223.255.255.0, in which the first three bits are 110.
• Multicast (formerly called Class D) -- The first four bits in the address are 1110, with addresses ranging from 224.0.0.0 to 239.255.255.255.
• Reserved for future/experimental use (formerly called Class E) -- addresses 240.0.0.0 to 254.255.255.254.

The first three (within Classes A, B and C) are those most used in creating subnets. Later, we'll see how a subnet uses these addresses. The IANA has outlined specific uses for multicast addresses within Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) documentRFC 5771. However, it hasn't designated a purpose or future plan for Class E addresses since it reserved the block in its 1989 document RFC 1112. Before IPv6, the Internet was filled with debate about whether the IANA should release Class E for general use.

Next, let's see how subnets work and find out who has those non-reserved IP addresses out on the Internet.

The following is an example of a subnet IP address you might have on your computer at home if you're using a router (wireless or wired) between your ISP connection and your computer:

• IP address: 192.168.1.102

• Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
• Twenty-four bits (three octets) reserved for network identity
• Eight bits (one octet) reserved for nodes
• Subnet identity based on subnet mask (first address): 192.168.1.0
• The reserved broadcast address for the subnet (last address): 192.168.1.255
• Example addresses on the same network: 192.168.1.1, 192.168.1.103
• Example addresses not on the same network: 192.168.2.1, 192.168.2.103

Besides reserving IP addresses, the IANA is also responsible for assigning blocks of IP addresses to certain entities, usually commercial or government organizations. Your Internet service provider (ISP) may be one of these entities, or it may be part of a larger block under the control of one of those entities. In order for you to connect to the Internet, your ISP will assign you one of these addresses. You can see a full list of IANA assignments and reservations for IPv4 addresses here.

If you only connect one computer to the Internet, that computer can use the address from your ISP. Many homes today, though, use routers to share a single Internet connection between multiple computers. Wireless routers have become especially popular in recent years, avoiding the need to run network cables between rooms.

If you use a router to share an Internet connection, the router gets the IP address issued directly from the ISP. Then, it creates and manages a subnet for all the computers connected to that router. If your computer's address falls into one of the reserved subnet ranges listed earlier, you're going through a router rather than connecting directly to the Internet.

IP addresses on a subnet have two parts: network and node. The network part identifies the subnet itself. The node, also called the host, is an individual piece of computer equipment connected to the network and requiring a unique address. Each computer knows how to separate the two parts of the IP address by using a subnet mask. A subnet mask looks somewhat like an IP address, but it's actually just a filter used to determine which part of an IP address designates the network and node.

A subnet mask consists of a series of 1 bits followed by a series of 0 bits. The 1 bits indicate those that should mask the network bits in the IP address, revealing only those that identify a unique node on that network. In the IPv4 standard, the most commonly used subnet masks have complete octets of 1s and 0s as follows:

• 255.0.0.0.0 = 11111111.00000000.00000000.00000000 = eight bits for networks, 24 bits for nodes
• 255.255.0.0 = 11111111.11111111.00000000.00000000 = 16 bits for networks, 16 bits for nodes
• 255.255.255.0 = 11111111. 11111111.11111111.00000000 = 24 bits for networks, eight bits for nodes

People who set up large networks determine what subnet mask works best based on the number of desired subnets or nodes. For more subnets, use more bits for the network; for more nodes per subnet, use more bits for the nodes. This may mean using non-standard mask values. For instance, if you want to use 10 bits for networks and 22 for nodes, your subnet mask value would require using 11000000 in the second octet, resulting in a subnet mask value of 255.192.0.0.

Another important thing to note about IP addresses in a subnet is that the first and last addresses are reserved. The first address identifies the subnet itself, and the last address identifies the broadcast address for systems on that subnet.

What Is A Network Packet?

It turns out that everything you do on the Internet involves packets. For example, every Web page that you receive comes as a series of packets, and every e-mail you send leaves as a series of packets. Networks that ship data around in small packets are called packet switched networks.

On the Internet, the network breaks an e-mail message into parts of a certain size in bytes. These are the packets. Each packet carries the information that will help it get to its destination -- the sender's IP address, the intended receiver's IP address, something that tells the network how many packets this e-mail message has been broken into and the number of this particular packet. The packets carry the data in the protocols that the Internet uses: Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP). Each packet contains part of the body of your message. A typical packet contains perhaps 1,000 or 1,500 bytes.

Each packet is then sent off to its destination by the best available route -- a route that might be taken by all the other packets in the message or by none of the other packets in the message. This makes the network more efficient. First, the network can balance the load across various pieces of equipment on a millisecond-by-millisecond basis. Second, if there is a problem with one piece of equipment in the network while a message is being transferred, packets can be routed around the problem, ensuring the delivery of the entire message.

Depending on the type of network, packets may be referred to by another name:

• frame
• block
• cell
• segment

Next, learn about the parts of packets and an example of how packets are applied.

Network Packet Structure

Most network packets are split into three parts:

Header - The header contains instructions about the data carried by the packet. These instructions may include:

• Length of packet (some networks have fixed-length packets, while others rely on the header to contain this information)
• Synchronization (a fewbits that help the packet match up to the network)
• Packet number (which packet this is in a sequence of packets)
• Protocol (on networks that carry multiple types of information, the protocol defines what type of packet is being transmitted: e-mail, Web page, streaming video)
• Destination address (where the packet is going)
• Originating address (where the packet came from)

Payload - Also called the body or data of a packet. This is the actual data that the packet is delivering to the destination. If a packet is fixed-length, then the payload may be padded with blank information to make it the right size.

Trailer - The trailer, sometimes called the footer, typically contains a couple of bits that tell the receiving device that it has reached the end of the packet. It may also have some type of error checking. The most common error checking used in packets is Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC). CRC is pretty neat. Here is how it works in certain computer networks: It takes the sum of all the 1s in the payload and adds them together. The result is stored as a hexadecimal value in the trailer. The receiving device adds up the 1s in the payload and compares the result to the value stored in the trailer. If the values match, the packet is good. But if the values do not match, the receiving device sends a request to the originating device to resend the packet.

As an example, let's look at how an e-mail message might get broken into packets. Let's say that you send an e-mail to a friend. The e-mail is about 3,500 bits (3.5 kilobits) in size. The network you send it over uses fixed-length packets of 1,024 bits (1 kilobit). The header of each packet is 96 bits long and the trailer is 32 bits long, leaving 896 bits for the payload. To break the 3,500 bits of message into packets, you will need four packets (divide 3,500 by 896). Three packets will contain 896 bits of payload and the fourth will have 812 bits. Here is what one of the four packets would contain:

Each packet's header will contain the proper protocols, the originating address (the IP address of your computer), the destination address (the IP address of the computer where you are sending the e-mail) and the packet number (1, 2, 3 or 4 since there are 4 packets). Routers in the network will look at the destination address in the header and compare it to their lookup table to find out where to send the packet. Once the packet arrives at its destination, your friend's computer will strip the header and trailer off each packet and reassemble the e-mail based on the numbered sequence of the packets.

What Is The Future Of The Internet ?

The Internet is just a few decades old, but in that short span of time it has experienced significant changes. It grew out of a hodgepodge of independent networks into a global entity. It serves as a platform for business, communication, entertainment and education. And you can connect to this enormous network through dozens of different devices.

What's next? When you can call up minute trivia about the most obscure subject you can think of with a couple of taps on a smartphone screen, where else can you go? The answer isn't entirely clear, but the possibilities are exciting.

One thing that seems certain is that data transmission speeds will increase globally. According to Akamai Technologies, which publishes a quarterly state of the Internet report, the average global data transmission speed in late 2009 was 1.7 megabits per second [source: Akamai]. Compare that to the record for data transmission speed set by Bell Labs: 100 petabits per second [source: PhysOrg]. That's equivalent to 100 billion megabits per second. At that speed, you could transmit 400 DVDs worth of data every second.

That's an enormous gap between what's currently possible and what's commercially available. But as time passes, the costs of producing ultra-high-speed networks will decrease. Eventually, the average consumer will be able to download a high-definition movie in a second or play cloud-based video games without a hint of lag.

Even as wired connections reach unprecedented speeds, wireless technology continues to evolve. Technologies like LTE and WiMAX give us the ability to access the Internet wirelessly at speeds comparable to broadband connections. It also opens the doors for portable devices like smartphones, laptops and tablets to plug into the Internet without the need for wires.

We believe that the Internet will be faster and more pervasive. What else might the future hold?

Net Neutrality and Proprietary Platforms

A battle has been brewing over the last couple of decades. That battle is being waged by advocates for and opponents to the concept of net neutrality. Net neutrality is an umbrella term that covers many concepts. Among those is the idea that everyone should be able to access everything on the Internet equally, no matter what service they use.

Some Internet service providers (ISPs) oppose this philosophy. It gives them less control over their own services. If an ISP could strike deals with content providers, it could give preferential treatment to its partners. Let's look at an example.

You've subscribed to ISP A. This ISP has struck a deal with Web site X. Under this agreement, ISP A's customers can visit Web site X using the fastest connections in ISP A's network. Web site Y is a competitor to Web site X. As part of the deal, ISP A slows down -- or perhaps even prevents -- traffic to Web site Y. Customers will tend to visit X over Y because they can get there faster. As a result, Web site Y suffers due to low user traffic.

If we extend the example, it gets even worse. Imagine an Internet in which the sites you can visit depend entirely upon which ISP you have. In some markets, you might not even have a choice of ISP -- one company may dominate the local market. That means you're stuck with whatever access the ISP decides to grant you. That's antithetical to the spirit of net neutrality.

Proprietary platforms may also be a threat to the Internet. Devices like video game consoles, smartphones and entertainment systems are attracting developers to create Internet applications. But while these applications give devices additional functionality, they also are creating divisions on the Internet. As each platform becomes more locked down, developers have to choose which platforms to support.

Ultimately, that means that the owners of these devices will each have a different experience when accessing the Internet. If this trend continues, it may become difficult to have a meaningful conversation about the Internet -- each person's perspective will be shaped by the devices he or she uses.

It may turn out that open platforms get the most support and outlast their proprietary counterparts. But that could be a long-term outcome. For the next several years, we'll likely see more locked-down systems accessing the Internet.

The Internet and Human Intelligence

Nicholas Carr wrote an article titled "Is Google making us stupid?" In it, Carr said he had noticed that as his reliance on the Internet for research and entertainment increased, other faculties seemed to atrophy. One of those was his concentration or focus. He hypothesized that because the way you navigate the Internet in general -- and the World Wide Web in particular -- you're always leaping from one piece of information to another [source: The Atlantic].

Could the Internet affect the way humans think? On the one hand, we have unprecedented access to an enormous library of information. Answers to questions ranging from "What is the Big Bang theory?" to "How long should I let dough rise?" are just a couple of clicks away. But does that information come at the cost of our own ability to think?

There does seem to be a correlation to the way we record and access information and the way we think. As we develop systems that allow us to save our knowledge for posterity, we unload that burden onto an inanimate object. That doesn't necessarily mean we become less intelligent.

Not everyone agrees with Carr's hypothesis. The Pew Research Center performs a survey each year about the future of the Internet. The research group polls a group of experts and industry analysts on a series of questions. For the 2010 report, one of the questions asked the respondents if they thought Carr was right about Google -- and the Internet in general -- making us stupid. Eighty-one percent of the experts disagreed.

But it's true that access to information doesn't equate to intelligence. You might be able to look up a fact, but that doesn't mean you understand what the fact means or its context. The Internet is a tool that we can use to help us learn -- it doesn't replace learning itself.

Optimists hope that the Internet will teach us about ourselves. The reach of the Internet is creeping into countries and cultures that have been segregated from the rest of the world. Some hope the Internet will provide the common ground that allows various people to learn and understand each other, possibly bringing about an era of peace and cooperation.

Ultimately, the Internet could begin to erase traditional boundaries between countries and cultures. But that sort of global change isn't trivial. It might take decades before we see a noticeable difference in the way we think of one another. Cynics may think even a tool as useful and pervasive as the Internet won't overcome the hurdles we face in becoming a united world.