Wireless Survey

[Heebeejeebee]

Hi,

Not sure if this is the right section, but my head has asked me to get the school surveyed for wireless since the (cheap) kit we have put in does not seem to cope or work very well.

It would seem that we have too many pipes/girders/wires/dense double skin walls etc for an effective signal to escape from one room to the next.

Has any-one here had a firm in to conduct a survey and to advise on the right sort of kit to deploy? If so who?

Thanks

HBJB

[Geoff]

IMHO Wireless sucks. Use cable whereever possible.

[Midget]

agreed. However have heard good things about Cisco's new wifi kit if you really MUST wifi the school. Waste of money IMHO though

[western]

Use wireless as it should be - (an enhancement to exisitng cabling) not as a total solution

[marco84]

We are in the process of having a wireless solution installed at the moment.
It is a managed 3com solution with a dumb POE AP in every teaching room in the whole school.
but as stated in a previous post, this is intended to compliment the wired infrastructure and not replace it.
But any company offering a wireless solution should carry out a wireless survey for you, free of charge.

[Ric_]

We have the BlueSocket managed kit and works pretty well. When getting quotes, I asked the suppliers to come in and conduct a survey of the areas that needed to be covered.

Watch the guys do the survey and if possible get any results, you can then install the kit yourself

I agree that wireless should never be used in a situation where it is possible to use wires but a good managed solution is far superior to cheaper consumer-level APs.

The reason I chose BlueSocket over Cisco is because the Cisco kit required you to purchase multiple modules to do this, that and the other - I don't like this way of doing things; I didn't go for the HP solution because it didn't have all the features of the others and the reason I decided against 3COM was because they don't use their own technology (Ariba I believe) so I wanted to play it safe in case 3COM and Ariba fell out.

If anybody wants to see the BlueSocket kit in action, they are welcome to come for a look 'round. The area of the school where it is predominantly used also suffers from dodgy wall construction and large amounts of safety glass containing wire mesh (which I believe is spaced at the same distance as wifi wavelengths - i.e. it is a perfect reflector!).

BTW - the BlueSocket APs (aka BAPs ) are also ABG and you can get kits that contain the controller and multiple BAPs which dramatically reduces the cost.

[Heebeejeebee]

Thanks for the replies.

I'm in full agreement about the uselessness of wireless as a total solution but the powers that be want to dish out loads of laptops to students and staff and insist that they must be able to connect anywhere.

Only half of our rooms are cabled and yet we will be moving over to E-reg after Easter (and no, they've not told me officialy yet, I got it from someone else). I'm going to cable all the rooms anyway in time and when that's done I suppose I could put a wireless unit in each or every other room and see how that goes. Oh and we install all the cables ourself here along with whiteboards/projectors/cabinets etc so I'm a bit out of touch with third party suppliers at the moment.

I sometimes think that we're given impossible tasks just to keep us on our toes. lol.

HBJB

[plexer]

If you are planning on doing some survey work yourself have a look at:

http://www.wi-spy.co.uk/

2.4ghz usb connected spectrum analyser to help you find interference etc...

Ben

[CyberNerd]

Sounds like time to go whack SMT over the head with Becta's technical specification for institutional infrastructure. It quite clearly says wireless is to support the wired network.
Failing that - and bearing in mind the amount of throughput you'll need on the wireless, you'd probably opt for a 5Ghz band network as it gives better penetration, and less problems. It's not cheap though.

Seems like the options for management are:
a) do it properly and wire it.
b) get a decent 5GHz network.
c) bodge it and keep Heebeejeebee 'fixing' wireless 'problems' whilst the rest of the ICT infrastructure falls apart.

Sometimes I think I might actually look forward to BSF ?!?

[Heebeejeebee]

a has been suggested and c is happening, b is an unknown quantity at the moment.

As for whacking SMT over the head .... I dream about it every day.

HBJB

[Ric_]

@Cybernerd: I think that Heebeejeebee is planning on using wireless to 'support' the wired network. As I mentioned above, the BlueSocket solution gives you dualband APs so that you can slowly migrate any clients if you see fit.

Another problem with 802.11a is that it's range isn't quite as good as 802.11b/g and if he's experiencing range problems now...

[Heebeejeebee]

Yep, I don't plan to use APs to connect to other APs. The units will only be going in areas that are already wired or will be wired in order to supply the AP.

Why oh why do the current "buzz words" have such a big effect on those who don't underdstand the inplications of it and make them expect it to happen overnight and work properly despite having no money thrown at it.

So from what I gather, buy cheap buy twice should be applied in this case. I should get a few firms in to take a look over the site and gleen some info on kit and prices from them and do it myself.

BTW at the moment we have a dozen or so Dlink APs (cheap and cheerful) and although they seem to be faily reliable when working they do need constant re-booting and they seem not to release the IP when it's lease is up. The range is poor and they arnn't capable of using two distint IP ranges and subnets....... come to think of it they're crap !!

Gaaahhhhh.

HBJB

[Ric_]

IIRC I paid several thousand pounds for a controller and 25 APs. I know of two suppliers that can get this kit.

I know it isn't cheap but you do get lots of features.... including multiple VLANs on an AP.

You can always re-deploy your D-Link APs as wireless clients for those random printers that MUST be put into a room or as a temporary client while you find the time to cable.

[Heebeejeebee]

IIRC I paid several thousand pounds for a controller and 25 APs. I know of two suppliers that can get this kit.

I know it isn't cheap but you do get lots of features.... including multiple VLANs on an AP.

You can always re-deploy your D-Link APs as wireless clients for those random printers that MUST be put into a room or as a temporary client while you find the time to cable.

Seems like I'll have to ask for a stack of cash then

What are the chances?

HBJB

[Ric_]

@Heebeejeebee: The way that I justified it was likening an AP to a wired switch...

Take your common-or-garden managed switch (remember we are talking about QoS and VLANs here) which will cost approx. £250 for 24 ports. A 'dumb' AP costs approx. £160 and will support up to 24 users. The AP does require a controller that will cost up to £3k but spread over 20 APs that's a maximum of £150. This brings you to £310 for 24 connections so it's not much difference in price.