Starting wireless network at school.

[kendalle01]

Our school is planning on purchasing 15-25 Dell laptops for use by students. The laptops will be equiped with a wireless card and travel from room to room on a Dell cart. I know very little about wireless and was given the two options by Dell on configuring the network-may not have this straight 😞

1. Have a wireless router on the cart so the laptops

can connect.

or

2. Have muliple access points located throughout

the school.

Seems pretty simple but would someone help with just a rough idea of what would be required?

[chris.houston]

If I understand you correctly, your options are using either a (1) bridged connection (one fixed bridge and a workgroup bridge that travels with the workstation, assuming all the laptops will be plugged into a hub/switch) or a (2) fixed AP solution (multiple mounted AP’s throughout your location).

The best solution depends on how much money you have to spend, and what kind of coverage area you require. There are a lot of environmental considerations that need to be looked at when dealing with RF signals. Wireless’s best feature is being able to roam without being tied to a cable.

Depending on the security you implement, you might need optional equipment, like an AAA server. But just to get going you would need the following:

For option 1, it would require 2 bridges and a hub/switch. One bridge would be wired to your LAN, the other bridge would be on the cart with the laptops. The laptops and the bridge would be connected with a hub or switch. Keep in mind range limitations of the RF signal.

Option 2, requires multiple AP’s through your coverage area that are connected to your LAN, however, as long as the laptops are with in range of an AP, they would work.

If you are interested in security, Cisco’s web site on SWAN is a great starting point.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/customer/products/hw/wireless/ps430/prod_brochure09186a0080184925.html

Hope this helps,

Chris

[thisisshanky]

To add to the above post,

These links are not heavily technical but sheds some light on mobile carts at a University and a school.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/wireless/ps430/prod_business_case09186a00800a400c.html

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/wireless/ps430/prod_business_case09186a00801ac056.html

[griffijo]

I work for a school district and we use the same scenario in about 30 schools. We typically purchase 2 access points and 20 - 25 laptops for each mobile cart that is used. The APs travel with the cart and are connected to the network wherever the cart is in use. The Cisco 1200s will actually load balance the associations. It works quite nicelly. The other option is to purchase enough APs to gain complete coverage in a building, how many you would have to purchase depends on a number of things such a the size of the facility and the type of construction. The most cost effective way is obviously to purchase a couple APs and have them travel with the cart\laptops.

[kendalle01]

If I understand your configuration, you have an Ethernet network running from room to room. You push the cart into a room and plug the 1200 into a jack/ethernet. Each connection from the room goes back to a switch (somewhere) and from the switch out to the WWW?

Is this roughly correct?

[griffijo]

That is correct, we use 2 1231 access points. Each room in the building has 4 - 8 wired connections. The district has had such good success with them that each building now has at least 1 cart.