Network Administrator vs System Administrator

Network Administrator Vs System Administrator

Network Administrator and System Administrator are the two terms that overlap each other but in reality, they are very different from each other. In this blog, we will discuss what the roles of network administrators and system administrators are and how they differ from each other.

Network Administrator:

The main responsibilities of the network administrator are to install, configure and support the local area network (LAN), wide area network (WAN), segment f a network system or internet system of an organization. It’s like a network administrator builds and maintains the road through which the system communicates.

The basic roles of the network administrator are as follows:

• Ordering network equipment: The network admin finds out the requirements which are needed for setting the new network and types of equipment like firewalls, switches, etc and gets the quotation from the different vendors.
• Configure/rack/test network equipment: It is the duty of the network administrator to deploy the equipment from the box to the rack. It is not that easy as a lot of planning is required before deploying the network. Planning revolves around IP space, access control, network segmentation, routing, network segregation, etc.
• Network Maintenance: Network equipment requires regular maintenance for patching & updates. It is the responsibility of network administrators to maintain these pieces of equipment for regular updates and he or she maintains the schedule of the window maintenance.
• Network Monitoring: Monitoring of the network is the biggest duty of a network administrator. A network admin knows the potential of a network outage and he or she can do this by using different software that is installed on the server. It is monitored through network devices via SNMP protocol.
• Network Troubleshooting: Whenever any problem occurs on a network, the network administrator finds the issue and troubleshoots it. In a network, continuous changes are made, out of which some changes fix one problem and create another issue. It is the network administrator’s job to find the root cause and solve the cause by implementing a potential solution.
• Cabling: Cables are used to connect devices in a network and the communication took place via cabling only. A network administrator is responsible for cabling.

System Administrator:

System administrators are responsible for the management, configuration & upkeep of computer systems of any business or organization.

The duties of the system administrator are as follows:

• Building/installing/configuring/Racking servers: System administrators are responsible for deploying the servers from the box to the rack. It covers the installation of the operating system, the setting of the RAID array, configuration of drive partitions, installation of updates, applications installation which are required and many more.
• Maintaining Servers: Servers require updates from the operating systems and applications & services that run on the server. It is the duty of the system administrator to maintain all the updates and scheduling of the window maintenance in case required. There are some servers in the business which are required to run all the time for the operation of the business and it is the duty of system administrator to manage its working. The maintenance of the window should be done on the weekends or at late night so that it should not impact the working of the business.
• Troubleshooting servers: During the working, there are chances that the server may face any issue which requires troubleshooting. It is the duty of the system administrator to troubleshoot the issue with a potential solution. He or he will find the root cause and on the basis of cause, they will fix the problem.
• Support: Most of the time system administrator are considered as tier 2 or tier 3 support system for help desk/ support team. In the case if tier 1 team is not able to resolve the issue related to the user, application or desktop then the system administrator tries to solve this.
• Project Management: The system administrator is responsible for project management. In the IT Company, it is common that new applications or new systems are designed regularly and it is the job of a system admin to understand these applications.

Key Differences : Network Administrator vs System Administrator

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