New lines or switches in your environment?

[aperture01]

Hi Everyone,

Just have a quick question for the masses. I've worked at several institutions before and I'm trying to gauge what is typical pracitce in an educational environment.

When you guys have departments who need additional capacity at their end points (adding a network printer to an office, more workstations, etc.) what do you guys do? Does IT have an additional line ran to the endpoint from the IDF, or does the department pay for it? Perhaps you install a switch at the endpoint and increase capacity there?

At my previous university we had a vendor who came out and ran network cabling, do you guys have on staff people that do this, or do you just use one of the methods above. I'm kind of against switches at the end point but that's what they've been doing.

I want to talk my CIO into having a vendor who does this on an open PO or case by case basis.

[nephilim]

additional switch if i dont have the capacity, additional cabling in either instance

[dhicks]

When you guys have departments who need additional capacity at their end points (adding a network printer to an office, more workstations, etc.) what do you guys do?

Assuming you have 8-core CAT5e cable between the switches and the sockets, you can cheat and use splitters to split the line. 100mb/s ethernet only uses (I think) 2 of the 8 cores, and you can get splitter devices off eBay that will give you 2 lines over the one bit of cable. You can't run gigabit ethernet over that, of course, but that probably won't be an issue just for a workstation.

[MatthewL]

New points with us, depending where it is depends who pays.

No mini switches or splitters to be used. Do a job and do it properly even if it costs.

The only time a switch will be used if it is temp.

[localzuk]

Depends on how critical things are, what the budget constraints are, where it is etc...

I sometimes go with network splitters.
Most of the time, I put a temporary solution in (splitter, or mini switch) and then save up a group of new cables to install and get a third party installer to put new ones in for us.

[glennda]

Depends what it is - if its going to be a low used printer - then yes just a little mini switch becuase actually 99.9% of the time the computer is going to get the 99.9% of the 100mbs to the mini-switch

put where i get cables put in i always get double - then if thats not enough i then get more but its always our budget that pays.

occasionaly if there is trunking already on the wall near where the item is being placed and a spare socket in the room i just make a cable plug it in the socket the it up the trunking to the ceiling across then down to where is needs to go.

[AngryTechnician]

On the cost angle: in all the schools I've worked at, infrastructure comes out of the IT budget - but the department has to notify in advance during budget time so that money can be put aside for it. If they don't, then it comes out of their budget.

I do all but the most arduous cabling jobs myself (pretty much everything apart from very large runs or fibre), because we did all our own cabling in my first school, so I have the necessary tools and know I can do a better job than most contractors.

I never use local switches as anything but a temporary measure, and I have to gird my loins even in those circumstances. Splitters and hubs are dirty words to me.

[qcomer]

Since our department does not have an operating budget in our district (which is very common here in the states from all the districts I have worked at) and the addition drop is not being mandated by us - we require the site or dept to pay for any and all costs.

We now run all network cables in house by our electrician and I am responsible for punching them down and connecting. The requesting dept/site is responsible for paying for any resources needed (cabling, switches, keystones, etc).

If there are not enough ports on the switch or patch panel we require somebody to purchase a new switch and/or patch panel and we require a minimum of a layer 2 switch.

If they cannot afford these purchases then they cannot afford adding the equipment, period.

[aperture01]

Seems that the concensus is exactly as I imagined. I need to see how I can get this implemented. We have way too many switches out there.

[chazzy2501]

unless you know the cable route and you have all the tools, stick to just repairing sockets. A contractor will have 2 guys 2 ladders 2 sets of tools and can get the job done quickly freeing you up. Also try and use it to bundle other jobs in, they will charge a minimum day rate and then per socket. You can then get them to do other runs throughout the building/s as it works out cost effcient that way.