While it is true, the vast majority of connection problems that occur when carrying out certain actions on the network or use a specific type of applications, are associated with the router ports. Because any program or application that communicates through the Internet makes use of one or more ports to be able to send and receive information.
That is why, today, much is said about the ability to open router ports for higher speed when a certain task is running on the network. Such as video conferencing, torrenting or downloader applications, online gaming, etc.
Thus, in order for you to know what this whole process is about, through which you will make the most of a router, we have made this post. Therefore, here you will find the exact definition of the ports of an ADSL router and what they work for, like the main types that are known today and also a complete list with each one that you can open in the router.
What are the ports of our router and what are they for?
Basically, an ADSL router refers to a device that has the ability to forward data packets from your computer between different networks or is defined as the one in charge of interconnecting computers that work within the framework of a certain network. Therefore, it works to establish the path that each data packet will use within any computer network.
In this sense, once you connect to a website, an external device or any service that has its own server, there is an exchange of data between said server and your computer. Which means that the only device that can handle this traffic is the router. Thus, when sending the information from your local network to the external one, the router makes use of a series of gates or channels in which all the content to be broadcast is organized.
These being, the router ports that can be defined as those “Virtual doors” or interfaces used by a computer connected to a network to support the input and output of data. Therefore, they are exemplified like some ship ports that can be opened and closed to allow information to pass through a network. In consecuense, slow download speed is present around torrent or instant messaging programs.
Like poor video conferencing quality or lag in online video games, it is claimed that are problems caused by some virtual doors of the router are closed. Since, these interfaces are the ones in charge of allowing the connection and are specific for certain actions. Reason why, there is the possibility of open router ports to maximize capacity.
What are the main types of ports that currently exist?
In general, two types of ports are distinguished with respect to the ADSL routers that are used today. Taking into account that each of them are used by a host-to-host protocol to determine to which higher-level program, application or protocol, all received messages should be transferred. Thus, the main classes of router interfaces that are known are: TCP ports (or “Transmission Control Protocol”) and UDP ports (or “User Datagram Protocol).
Here are its most interesting features:
TCP ports
In Spanish that means “Transmission control protocol” and it consists of one of the most fundamental protocols in the network. Thanks to the fact that TCP supports many of the applications used on the Internet by almost 100% of the people who access it, such as: web browsers, FTP clients, file exchange and application protocol (HTTP, SSH, FTP and SMTP).
In addition to this, many software within a data structure composed of computer networks can make use of TCP ports to succeed in creating connections with each other from which a certain data stream can be transferred. Best of all, this protocol guarantees that this information will be sent to its destination without any error and in the same order.
They are also ports that are responsible for providing a mechanism for manage to differentiate several applications within the same machine and solely through the concept of “port”. It should be noted that the main purpose of TCP is that applications can communicate safely regardless of the lower layers. What’s more, offers remarkable flexibility in host-to-host connections and relieves system load, to a large degree.
UDP ports
It is the acronym for “User Datagram Protocol”, in Spanish; which is a connectionless protocol that works on IP networks. In this way, it is known as a simple data transmission protocol that is based on the exchange of datagrams, so accepts the sending of the same through the network without, before that, a connection has been established. This, because, the same datagram adds sufficient addressing data in its header.
In addition to this, UDP ports are characterized by offering very few error recovery services and, instead, they only provide a direct way to send and obtain datagrams from an IP network. Therefore, it is used when speed is the most important factor in data transmission, especially. Since, by its nature, it is much faster than TCP ports.
However, it should be distinguished that, does not have confirmation or flow control, unlike TCP ports. Reason for which, the packages may anticipate each other and it is not guaranteed that they will arrive in the order indicated from the beginning, given that there is no confirmation of delivery or receipt. Valuing that, this class of ports were created with the objective to provide more speed in sending information with less demands for stability and security.
On the other hand, it is also necessary to distinguish that all routers have 65,536 ports in their totality, which are numbered from 0 to 65,535. In this way, the entity in charge of the global assignment of IP addresses and everything that concerns Internet protocols, known as IANA (“Internet Assigned Numbers Authority”), has proposed a port assignment standard and, for that reason, today there are three categories of virtual doors that have a certain function.
Here, we specify the three existing groups:
Ports 0 to 1023
Basically, they are the most recognized ports because are reserved for the operating system of the computer in question and, likewise, they are the most essential protocols to guarantee optimal operation. Thus, a clear example of this is found in port 80 for HTTP.
Ports 1024 to 49151
In the second designated category, we find the registered ports consisting of those that are used exclusively by the applications and games that are installed on the machine. In this way, they are usually configured during their installation processes, automatically.
Ports 49152 to 65535
These interfaces are known as “Dynamic or private ports” and they refer to those that correspond to all those applications that must connect to a server in order to function properly. Among the clearest examples in this regard, we find P2P download clients.
List of all ports that you can open on your Internet router
Now, to get the most out of your router’s capabilities, it will sometimes be necessary to open a certain virtual door to enjoy a better connection speed for a certain activity. Which, in most cases, happens because that port has not been configured correctly and at the moment in which you want to use a program or application, problems will arise.
The computer will not have knowledge about which door must open to the data to admit the passage of information and it also won’t know which application it should reissue to. Consequently, downloads will be very slow or video game lag will occur. Thus, it is recommended to open the interfaces of an ADSL router And, to be able to do it correctly, it is necessary to know which are each and every one of the ports of a router that can be started without any problem.
Therefore, below, we show you a complete list of them: