With prices for laptop computers falling and a new campus-wide wireless network being finished at Dartmouth, the prospects for student computing have never looked better -- especially outside in the Hanover sunshine.
"It's great. Now I can sit outside and check email," Kate Hitchings '03 said as she relaxed with a friend outside the Collis Center on a sunny July day, working on an English paper on her new Apple iBook notebook computer.
If predictions hold true, students like Hitchings will become an increasingly common sight as members of the Class of 2005 arrive -- perhaps to the jealous onlooking gazes of upperclassmen -- with the latest equipment designed to take advantage of Dartmouth's newly-implemented wireless network.
"Well over 90 percent of campus is covered, including athletic fields [and] athletic facilities," Bill Brawley, spokesman for Dartmouth Computing Services, explained.
The network, which is to cover the interior of all buildings and nearly the entire outside area of campus, allows students to roam freely with their computers while remaining connected to BlitzMail (Dartmouth's email program) and the Internet.
A computer with a wireless network card adhering to the industry 802.11b standard, dubbed "AirPort" by Apple Computer, Inc., is required to use the service.
The service is available to all College students, faculty and staff free of charge on an unlimited basis, but requires a security check-in to authenticate the user as being a member of one of those groups.
Incoming students who opt for notebook computers of either type can, if they order them through the College, can expect the wireless-network cards to be pre-installed in their computers and "ready to go," Brawley said.
Offering data transfer speeds approximately equal to conventional connections to the campus network, the wireless network is fully compatible with both Windows-based and Apple machines. In addition, some Linux users have reported success, Brawley said.
Each base station has a range of several hundred feet, according to the web sites of Apple Computer, Inc. and Cisco Systems, Inc., two companies that market the technology. The speed of the connection varies somewhat with distance from the base station and with the number of users sharing that connection at any one time.
A group of students and faculty at Dartmouth has been researching exactly what new applications might spring from the new possibilities afforded by wireless computers with high-speed networking capability.
Implementing the wireless network has taken about a year, with the first nodes in Sudikoff Hall giving way to the present campus-spanning constellation of some 450 base stations hidden in College buildings.
Along the way, according to Brawley, much of the network equipment was donated by Dartmouth alumni working for Cisco Systems, Inc., manufacturer of the network radio receivers and transmitters. The substantial cost of installation was fronted by the College, Brawley said.
All told, the system is valued at well over $500,000, according to Brawley.
In the future, the present system can be upgraded to newer security standards as they arise, and may be capable of increased speeds, Brawley said, adding that for now, however, the system has been deployed with "as few impediments as possible" in order to get a large number of users up and running.
Achieving total network coverage on the campus was not easy. Certain buildings, such as Cummings Hall, Baker/Berry Library and the Hopkins Center, require up to 25 base stations each because of their large size and heavy, radio-blocking concrete and steel structures, according to Computing Services' Wireless Info web page. Other buildings, such as dormitories, generally require two to four base stations each.
