Wireless
Wireless Network Infrastructure
In preparation for a move towards this 1:1 initiative, the technology department has spent the last couple of years researching and implementing a Ruckus wireless system that encompasses the entire school. This system is designed to allow an average of 800 faculty, staff, and students to maintain internet access on an average of 2 devices each, as well maintain functionality for office and business needs. In several independent studies Ruckus was the top performer in the industry especially if you consider cost to performance. Below are some graphs from a test that took several top wireless systems and put them into real world scenarios.
Ruckus Performance Comparison
Good Wi-Fi is not about brute force and raw speed. It’s about understanding RF and doing something about it. The products that outperformed in our testing weren’t the biggest and most expensive, or even the ones that used the highest number of streams. Ruckus puts forth the best effort in the largest number of tests, but it does so with a mere 2x2:2 design through engineering and deep attention to the factors necessary to provide a high-quality wireless experience in increasingly hostile RF conditions. From our group, Cisco is the only other vendor that seems to have provided even close to the same level of attention and control. To check out this test in depth go to http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/wi-fi-performance,2985.html
Our ruckus Access points use a 3x3 technology that can put out up to 450mbs a second per client. Syracuse University also did a study on the same build as our wireless system (below).
Syracuse University
Note that throughput at 5 GHz, where bandwidth is double what it is in 2.4 GHz, there is roughly a 75% boost over throughput at 2.4 GHz.
The Ruckus AP again performed very well, achieving the highest aggregate throughput in each test at this range. http://dcc.syr.edu/PDF/CCENT_3-stream_eval.pdf