New network build

[Roberto]

Rofl, I nearly spat my beer out...

 

Automated, Clever... Having experienced a few BMS i can't see "automated and clever" being applicable as an AND

 

Rob

 

Oh no. Ours is very clever. It knows the exact precise time to fall over all the time in order to fsck us up in the most effective way possible. It knows what it's doing for sure.

[john]

One strange thing that seems weird but well worth it is actually look at the Electrical Dado they are using and specify that yourselves. For example our refurbishment has some lovely Marshall Tufflex dado in it very nice at a price of heading towards £100 a length however its cured like a C shape when looked at in profile, as a result the In-Wall amps stick out and don't fit correctly and thus have to either be sealed around or you have to mount a slim surface patress to the dado backbox with the rear cut out of it to then secure it fully which looks just silly.

[TheScarfedOne]

We've got that fancy three compartment stuff...but new guidelines mean we've got those coloured fillets around sockets to highlight them. On a plus, the compartments have plenty of scope to expand in future and there's lots of it around the rooms.

[john]

We've got that fancy three compartment stuff...but new guidelines mean we've got those coloured fillets around sockets to highlight them. On a plus, the compartments have plenty of scope to expand in future and there's lots of it around the rooms.

 

Contrasting colours is part of the regulations so our sockets are grey, well bar the data outlets which annoyed the architects as Excel don't make grey outlets haha and as that was my spec they had to adhere to it

 

When I spec dado trunking I use REHAU COMPACT Data now as its really nice and not too expensive and Rehau seem to know how to make a good product that just works They have good solutions for the contrasting colours setup as well with contrasting top so you can use white sockets and outlets

[Gaz]

It appears there is more to this than I bargained for, but all this info is useful even the criticism.

 

Its sounding like this could be a shared building so BMS will be out of the window as that would be done by the site owner, so would things like trunking.

I would get to choose the core of the networking gizmos that would be needed such as power, switches, ups, routers, cabling, racks, servers, etc etc

@twin--turbo can you expand on this. Why is it perfereable?

>>Gigabit switches for computer rooms with wall mounted cabinets

Avoid this if you can, central distro rooms preferable.

[clockend25]

Would you not be taking any kit across with you?

[Gaz]

We don't have a lot of equipment at the moment and we are due to expand. We currently have 2 servers, one of which would be the content filter as I plan to stay with Smoothwall despite the shoddy support of late, the other could play backup. I'd like a new server for the AD, DNS, and other such things.

 

The switch that we currently have may be used somewhere but probably not up to the job of a core switch (Cisco SG300)

 

The Computers would come but the older ones would be binned so we would need more to make up the numbers, each computer room would have 16 PC's in it, there would then be an office with ~10PC's in it. We have 20 machines that we could bring over so we would need around 38 more, 28 workstations and 10 SFF office PC's around 50 in total, not including users using their own laptops.

[januttall]

Redundant links would be a very good idea and try to use a core a distribution and an access layer will make it easier on upgrades and future work also plan now for upgrades in another 3-4 years so if they want to add another 200+Pc's where in your topology will it go and how easy would it be. think disaster recovery too.

 

N.B Put all your switches on UPS's and try to use fiber for connecting cabinets/racks together floor mounted racks are far easier to deal with than cabinets and fiber between racks/cabinets prevents surges from propagating and also works faster not just because its light.

Edited February 26, 2013 by januttall

[twin--turbo]

>>Gigabit switches for computer rooms with wall mounted cabinets

Avoid this if you can, central distro rooms preferable.

 

You want to keep the active equipment away from the user environment.

 

You want it someher with Cooling

 

You will also find that you may have 30 outlets whcih means 2x24port switches ( a waste of 18 ports ).

 

You can balance ports across more than one switch centraly so a whole room is not affected by an outage.

 

Switches add noise.

 

Repatching in a classroom can be anoying for yourself and the users.

 

Expensive extra ... cabinets, termination, power.

 

It's unsightly.

 

Rob

[supawat1]

Ceiling/wall data Socket for your Projector. A nice to have for your projector's management system

[Gaz]

Redundant links has been mentioned and so has core distribution. Normally redundant links would be used if there was a switch in the computer room, but if theres no switch in the computer room because theres a core distribution then where are the redundant links placed? Sorry again if that sounds silly but I've never been asked to do this sort of thing before.

 

EDIT:

Cheers Rob.

Edited February 26, 2013 by Gaz

[januttall]

Redundant links has been mentioned and so has core distribution. Normally redundant links would be used if there was a switch in the computer room, but if theres no switch in the computer room because theres a core distribution then where are the redundant links placed? Sorry again if that sounds silly but I've never been asked to do this sort of thing before.

 

EDIT:

Cheers Rob.

your redundant links go between all of your switches so that if a switch or cable dies it will automatically change over between (relies on STP) as normally duplicate links cause Loops. connect each of your switches to the others e.g. core - Distribution and Distribution - Distribution. it allows some maneuverability if something fails. and your core switches should also be connected with redundant links to each other.

 

Not the best example but something like bellow. (FYI quick Google search)

Edited February 26, 2013 by januttall

[Gaz]

Arh yes, thats kinda what I suspected.

[MrPstv]

Thought i would jump on board with this as we are in a similar situation,

 

Could anyone provide links for information relating to regulations when looking at installing new server rooms,cabs,office spaces,hall space,classrooms and a place for the I.T. guys to work from.

i have stumbled upon guidelines from other local authority's relating to installations of new work spaces but these are a few years old.

[Gaz]

I wouldn't mind looking at the links you have found so far if you care to share.

[twin--turbo]

We have 1 server room and 3 distribution rooms on both our sites with redundant links as mentioned.

 

and each distro room has redundant links to edge switches.

 

Rob

[psydii]

....use the v1910 across the whole site (it supports VLANs, Static Routing, ACLs and QoS... what more do you really need?).

 

This it turns out is a terrible idea, unless you're a samll PRU, Specialist, primary.

 

The v1910 has a hard coded limit of 256 entries in its ARP table which limits the size of the network it can act as a router for. It still makes a great value semi-smart edge though.

Edited February 26, 2013 by psydii

[psydii]

These old Becta documents aren't a bad place to start:

[ARCHIVED CONTENT] Industry and developers - Becta's specifications - Becta

 

In fact they are up on the Department for Education site too:

http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/adminandfinance/procurement/b0069801/buying/ict/developing-an-ict-infrastructure

 

Note that I have always had Wireless as a first class access medium, so not everything they say is true.

Edited February 26, 2013 by psydii

[januttall]

in terms of legal requirements. you must use Low Smoke Cabling and have Low Smoke Devices in Plenum spaces so WAP's above ceiling panels or in attics must be of the correct standard. as must the cables and cable coatings, unless inside Metal pipes, also firewalls (Not the digital security type) must be correctly penetrated and this includes cavity walls, e.g they must have a Pipe between them sealed with the correct sealants. in terms of the local authority i don't know what they want i work in a school but i haven't seen any guidelines. i understand BECTA were the country's standards but i haven't seen there documentation either. Edited February 26, 2013 by januttall

[MrPstv]

no problem i will send via email if you would be so kind to provide your email address. i have the pdf docs and not the links.

[psydii]

Hamzah, can you post them here?

[psydii]

On redundant links one way to have some protection while keeping costs down would be to link the top and bottom switch in a cabinet back to the core by separate pairs within a single run so that if either switch failed the rest of the switches in the cabinet could still communicate with the core. You are still at risk of a fibre cut taking out the cab, but usually if that happens they find some way to cut both fibre runs anyway.

[MrPstv]

Pdf's fyi

Primary Brief for ICT Infrastructure and Resources.pdf

Technical Principles for ICT in Primary School Building Design V1 0 Aug 2011 (1).pdf

KentPrimarySchoolsITDesignGuide.pdf

[MrPstv]

I hope this helps as it is a resource which i will be referring to.

[januttall]

On redundant links one way to have some protection while keeping costs down would be to link the top and bottom switch in a cabinet back to the core by separate pairs within a single run so that if either switch failed the rest of the switches in the cabinet could still communicate with the core. You are still at risk of a fibre cut taking out the cab, but usually if that happens they find some way to cut both fibre runs anyway.

 

I wouldn't Daisy chain switches together E.g Switch > Switch > Switch. only because your limiting the total through put of the network to the link speeds between them try and star them out a little 1 switch to many your network will work more efficiently. by all means use different switches in each cabinet to link to the main core but put extra redundant links in so that both are connected directly to all of the others in the cabinet.

 

Best case is to run a multi core to each cabinet and run each switch directly to the main Core or distribution layer. then link them together with copper or fiber as a redundant link, you may also want to run a link from each cabinet to another i would use fiber this helps if your entire multi core goes down. but this is far more expensive, and more complicated but allows a lot more stability.

Edited February 26, 2013 by januttall