Carnegie Mellon Plans Four-Fold Expansion of Its High-Speed Wireless Network

Contact: Carnegie Mellon: Anne Watzman

For immediate release: (412) 268-3830
aw16@andrew.cmu.edu
Lucent: Mark Shapiro
Davis-Marrin Communications
(619)-573-0736
DMC@CTS.COM

PITTSBURGH--Carnegie Mellon University, which has developed one of the nations largest high-speed wireless networks, will expand its system four-fold, from more than 100 access points* in six academic buildings to about 400, covering all of the academic and administrative facilities on the university’s 103-acre campus.

The network, which has been in service since February 1997, presently supports the university’s wireless research program, which includes several projects funded at nearly $20 million. Operating at two megabits per second, it provides Ethernet-like speed to participants in these projects, including a few robots, as they move about the campus with their laptops and other mobile computers. The expansion will afford the same capability to all members of the university community.

The expanded network is being built under Carnegie Mellon’s continuing partnership with Lucent Technologies, Inc., and will use Lucent’s new WaveLAN /IEEE product line. (WaveLAN/IEEE conforms with the new IEEE 802.11 wireless LAN standard and uses 2.4 GHz direct sequence spread spectrum technology.)

“Universities and educational facilities worldwide are discovering the flexibility and cost effectiveness of wireless LANs,” said Angela Champness, Lucent Technologies’ director of product and business development. “Carnegie Mellon is consistently in the forefront, using new technologies which provide mobile internet access to students and faculty throughout the campus.”

“With the wireless network in full operation, any member of the Carnegie Mellon community will be able to purchase a wireless network interface card (PC card size) at the university’s computer store,” said Alex Hills, Carnegie Mellon’s vice provost for computing services. “A simple registration procedure will allow a log on to the network and full mobile operation anywhere on campus with a laptop or other mobile computer.”

Hills added that while wireless data service can also be obtained using cellular and other metropolitan area services, none of these allow the high speed (2Mbps) available at Carnegie Mellon.

“Current users of the wireless network freely ‘surf the World Wide Web and receive both sound and pictures on their mobile computers without significant delay,” he said. “Such applications involve considerable delays using any of the older, metropolitan area services.”

The expanded campus wireless network will continue to support Carnegie Mellon’s wireless research initiative. This five-year-old effort comprises a number of separate projects, which are making wireless computer networks far easier to use.

Carnegie Mellon’s wireless research projects include disconnected operation of distributed file systems, wearable computers and transparent networking support for mobile hosts. More information can be found at: http://www.ini.cmu.edu/

* Access points connect the wireless network to the wired network. In addition, a waveLAN access point can connect wireless users to each other.