  In the distributed quantum computing paradigm, well-controlled few-qubit
`nodes' are networked together by connections which are relatively noisy and
failure prone. A practical scheme must offer high tolerance to errors while
requiring only simple (i.e. few-qubit) nodes. Here we show that relatively
modest, three-qubit nodes can support advanced purification techniques and so
offer robust scalability: the infidelity in the entanglement channel may be
permitted to approach 10% if the infidelity in local operations is of order
0.1%. Our tolerance of network noise is therefore a order of magnitude beyond
prior schemes, and our architecture remains robust even in the presence of
considerable decoherence rates (memory errors). We compare the performance with
that of schemes involving nodes of lower and higher complexity. Ion traps, and
NV- centres in diamond, are two highly relevant emerging technologies.
