Networking is a sometimes confusing world. There are many networking options built into Max, and this article will endeavour to make clear which option is best for your application.
vt is an external for max/msp is a mix between [send]/[receive], [grab] and [value] with some extra functionality.
In order to maximize the potential of the built-in networking classes that are new with version 4.5 of Max, it's helpful to understand a few things about the way that modern network protocols operate.