Meru Networks Wireless LAN Supports Farmington, N.M., Schools' One-Laptop-Per-Student Initiative
2008-09-15 19:47:01 -
www.merunetworks.com - Meru Networks, Inc. Rachna Ahlawat, 408-916-1466 rahlawat@merunetworks.com or Ulevich & Orrange, Inc. Janis Ulevich, 650-329-1590 ulevich@u-o.com New Mexico's Farmington Municipal School District has installed Meru Networks wireless LANs in four middle schools in conjunction with the launch of its Learning Initiative, which provides one laptop per student as part of its technology component. Plans call for extending the Meru deployment district-wide, to high schools and elementary schools, in the next several years.
The district chose a Meru solution based on IEEE 802.11n, the newest, highest-performance version of the Wi-Fi standard, in part because of 11n support in the Apple MacBook laptop computers being distributed as part of the Farmington Learning Initiative. The Meru 802.11n access points Farmington is using - with approximately 70 installed to date - also support the legacy 802.11a/b/g standards used by older client devices.
The Meru WLAN was put to the test during the week of August 11, when the district handed out the first 2,000 laptops to sixth, seventh and eighth graders. During the handout and registration process, up to 75 of the laptops were connected to the Meru network at any given time in a large common area.
"Without the Meru network we would not have been able to effectively distribute large numbers of laptops so quickly," said Charles Thacker, chief technology officer for Farmington Municipal Schools. "Users were joining and leaving the network throughout the four-hour distribution process, and we had no connectivity issues at all."
The Meru WLAN replaces a Cisco wireless network installed several years ago in Farmington schools, which Thacker said was having channel interference problems and handoff issues (connectivity loss or interruption as users moved between access points).
"Both students and teachers were experiencing a high level of frustration because of frequent interruptions to their connections and a general network slowdown," Thacker said. "Educators will only suffer having their lesson plans disrupted a couple of times - then they will stop using the tool."
Thacker and his staff conducted a comprehensive evaluation of top WLAN solutions, simulating a high-density classroom-like environment and allowing participating vendors to configure their own equipment for maximum effectiveness.
"Meru clearly provided a performance boost over other vendors in deployments typical of our classrooms," Thacker said. "Meru's ability to put all traffic on a single channel avoids the co-channel interference problems we were having before, and we can layer channels to increase capacity if needed. Their virtual cell capability eliminates handoff issues, and an airtime fairness feature keeps slower clients from dragging down the connection speed of faster ones, so it's never a problem to have a mix of 11b, g and n users on the same network."
The district worked with Albuquerque-based Harmonix Technologies, a Meru reseller partner, on the WLAN testing and deployment. Harmonix CEO Jack Vigil said, "No other wireless vendor has the technical capability to handle the high-density user environments that are characteristic of the Farmington schools. With other vendors, who use a micro cell approach rather than virtual cell, you wouldn't be able to turn up the RF signals as high because it would cause interference issues."
Over the next several years, Farmington Municipal Schools will expand the Meru WLAN network to administrative offices, then the district's three high schools, and eventually 10 elementary schools. Ultimately up to 300 access points will be deployed.
Meru's single-channel approach to wireless coverage minimizes interference by automatically selecting one channel for use enterprise-wide and layering additional channels where more capacity is required. With all access points (APs) occupying the same channel in a single "virtual cell," the network can select the AP that will provide a given client with the highest data rate. The reliability of wireless connections is maximized independent of client type, and zero-latency roaming is enabled by the elimination of call "handoffs" between APs when clients roam. In contrast, legacy systems use a "micro cell" approach, which assigns different channels to adjacent AP cells, requiring precise and time-consuming channel planning and AP power adjustments, making it difficult to load-balance in dense environments, and limiting future network expansion.
About Farmington Municipal Schools
The Farmington Municipal School District is located in the beautiful Four Corners region of the American southwest. The district consists of more than 10,000 students and 1,200 staff members, and includes three high schools, four middle schools, 10 elementary schools and two pre-schools. For more information, visit www.fms.k12.nm.us.
About Meru Networks
Meru Networks develops and markets wireless infrastructure solutions that enable the All-Wireless Enterprise. Its industry-leading innovations deliver pervasive, wireless service fidelity for business-critical applications to major Fortune 500 enterprises, universities, healthcare organizations and local, state and federal government agencies. Meru's award-winning Air Traffic Control technology brings the benefits of the cellular world to the wireless LAN environment, and its WLAN System is the only solution on the market that delivers predictable bandwidth and over-the-air quality of service with the reliability, scalability and security necessary to deliver converged voice and data services over a single WLAN infrastructure. Founded in 2002, Meru is based in Sunnyvale, Calif. For more information, visit www.merunetworks.com or call (408) 215-5300.
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