Simply put, a wireless mesh is a wireless network without the cables.   The concept is not really that new, the military, hospitals and some commercial enterprises have been using similar technologies for many years to create ad-hoc radio networks.  It can include a wireless internet gateway or a gateway to an upstream network, but sometimes […]

Copper-based network cabling has been with us since day one.   The first networks used TV style coax cabling and connectors because it already existed and was known to work. In many cases, manufacturers had already used that style of cabling to connect terminals to mainframes.    Some manufacturers, particularly IBM, developed their own cabling styles, but […]

With smaller networks, the core/distribution/access layer topology is generally sufficient. This three-layer architecture is especially efficient in “North-South” data transfer, that is, traffic that comes into and leaves the Data Centre.   The transmission latency between two internal points of the network is generally not a great concern.  However, in Enterprise and Campus networks with a […]

The worst nightmare of network support are intermittent or transient network cabling faults.  They take up a lot of time to find and correct and are often only a simple cabling error.  Copper ethernet data cabling also deteriorates and old network cabling can produce mysterious errors from time to time. Here are five tips to […]

The world of IT cabling has changed dramatically over the years from the early vendor specific cabling methods to today’s Structured Cabling environments.  It used to be only copper, then came various varieties of fibre optic cables, and WiFi, wireless and laser and free-space optical connectivity among others.  Even copper as a structured cabling component […]

The network world is constantly changing.  Hardware developments bring developments in software, which in turn bring further advances in hardware and so-on.  Similarly, the complexity of networks has increased.  The core, distribution, access layers model is giving way to Spine and Leaf, and Software Defined Network Access (“SDNA”) is redefining the way we configure and […]

On the face of it, data cable installation is not a difficult job. The designers give you a map of the cable runs, specifies the cables that are to be used in the data runs and the associated trays and so‑on, and how they are to be terminated at both ends.   In a Structured Cabling […]

In two years or so, we can expect 400Gb fibre broadband speeds in the data centre and we hear that terabyte speeds have been achieved in lab tests. An apparently entirely unconnected statistic is that there will be over 6Billion new smartphone users worldwide in the next four years. Think about it though, more smartphone […]

Back in the day, to most people debug meant identifying and sorting out the errors in a bit of programming code. Nowadays, it’s a good bit more than that.  The effective functioning of the data centre according to accepted standards is crucial to the business. Most businesses spend time and effort gathering information and statistics […]

Changing a network design is not something you do every day. It can cost time, money and a great deal of effort.  Often network managers shy away from a redesign until forced to do so.  Changing the network structure means changing your physical and logical equipment and configurations, your management procedures, your management metrics and […]