Chapter 3. Use Cases; Tempest University's Hotspot Deployment; Tempest University's Current Ws5100 Configuration - Motorola WS5100 Series Migration Giude

3.1 Tempest University's Hotspot Deployment

This chapter presents a use case illustrating the challenges faced by Tempest University when migrating
their existing WS5100 2.x implementation to the new WS5100 3.0 baseline.
Tempest University (inaugurated in 1993) has grown rapidly in recent years and is one of the most popular
universities in Ireland. The university has approximately 18,000 students, but has increased its student
enrollment applications 70% in the last three years.
With this expanding student population in mind, the Tempest University IT department needed to provide its
students a flexible and convenient means to access the their wireless infrastructure. The University
purchased 1500 wired PCs for student access in fixed areas, but faced the problem of providing students
wireless access to the university's network using mobile devices connecting to the campus WLAN.
The University required a system that could be easily administered, secure and be relocated as their campus
grew. The IT department determined a wireless switch system would significantly lower the cost of
deploying a scalable network infrastructure and drive down the cost of managing, maintaining and upgrading
wireless systems as the student population and number of mobile users grew.
The University decided to standardize on Motorola's WS5100 and AP300 Access Port. The first switches and
access ports were deployed at the University network in December 2002 and the system provided students
with wireless networking speeds of up to 54 Mbps.
Free from the constraints of cables, the new WS5100 managed WLAN allowed student network access from
seminar rooms, lecture theatres, student unions and other areas across campus. In addition, the WS5100
deployment allowed the University to increase the computer-to-students ratio without having to dedicate
additional (and expensive) floor space to fixed PCs.

3.2 Tempest University's Current WS5100 Configuration

Tempest University currently deploys the following WS5100 configuration:
• Five primary WS5100 switches (running the 2.x baseline) backed by an additional five switches for
redundancy.
• 400 AP300 Access Ports to support the 1500 PCs receiving wireless radio coverage around the campus.
• EAP support on each switch with 5 switches configured as masters and the remaining 5 configured as
slaves.
Use Cases