On Friday, Feb. 21, Lakeland’s wireless network underwent scheduled downtime to allow an upgrade to the fiber cable that provides Lakeland’s internet service. Technicians from Time Warner Cable (TWC), Lakeland’s internet service provider, worked late into the night with Lakeland’s Information Technology (IT) administrators. The upgrade was substantial; Lakeland’s bandwidth has increased tenfold.
To use a metaphor, the old cable gave Lakeland a small creek’s worth of internet access. The access was divided among the access points, which allowed it to drip to devices as it was requested. The new cable provides a river’s worth of access. There is plenty for all access points to distribute to devices.
Brian Barber, manager of desktop support, reports download speeds of over 750 mbps (megabits per second) and upload speeds of over 350 mbps, when directly connected to a wall port.
“To put that in perspective, you could upload an entire HD movie in about two minutes,” Barber said.
The increase in bandwidth was the final product of a series of upgrades to Lakeland’s wireless internet hardware. IT staff and student workers have been programming and installing new, faster access points since last summer. These new access points have the ability to move more information than the old ones.
With the additional cable upgrade from TWC, the new access points are able to process much more information more quickly. Student workers in IT say the number of Wi-Fi complaints is already decreasing.
Lakeland’s wireless system is equipped with programs that distribute internet availability according to need. Since there was not much bandwidth available before the upgrade, the programs would move access to wireless internet in the residence halls to make it more available in heavily-trafficked areas or classrooms. Now that the available bandwidth has been increased, students should notice a positive change in wireless access in residence halls.