I am currently doing a project for my school networking class and was in need of some help. We have to make a proposal to upgrad the schools network, currently a T1 being used by close to 250 computers(about 35 are Mac G4-G5) connected by Cisco 2950 series switches. Many people working on this project say that we need to go to gigabit ethernet to make the network run faster, others are saying wireless. Would you recommend wireless, Gigabit, T3 or a mixture of things. Would you say that the T1 needs to be upgraded to a T3 and continue to use 100Mb connections? Or do you think that wireless would be a good solution? Thanks for your advise

Forgot to mention that one of the main reasons to upgrade to wireless is to get rid of the Cat5e wire problem (cables going everywhere) in some rooms

Ok, first off, wireless isn't going to supply the speed you're looking for. G is 54 Mbps and the N (which isn't a standard as of yet) is 108 Mbps. You're already getting 100 Mbps bandwidth from your 2950 so even if you went with N wireless, it's no improvement with regard to bandwidth. I haven't touched on problems with signal strength and interferance from walls and other things. It's enough to know that no matter what you do, wireless isn't going to "improve" bandwidth. Speed considerations aside, wireless is inherently insecure and should never be used to access any sensitive data of any kind. There's a reason financial institutions do not use wireless. My honest opinion is simple, wireless is NOT the way to go. If you have cables "going everywhere" then it begs the question, why weren't they pulled inside of the walls? Properly done, the only cables you should see are the patch cables running from the PC's to the wall jacks. I recommend as part of your upgrade you do a proper, professional job of the cabling. Personally, if I walked into a "school" that had cables running around on the floors and hanging from ceilings, I'd turn around and walk right back out and go find a school that knows what it's doing. Upgrading to a 1000 Mbps switch would be nice but the question is, do you transfer large amounts of data between PC's and/or between PC's and server(s)? If not, then I suspect a 1000 Mbps switch isn't necessary. If all you're doing is surfing the web with these PC's then you could leave your 2950 in place and concentrate on upgrading your internet connection. T1 or T3? Can you afford a T3? Upgrading of any kind always depends on budget. If you can afford it then by all means, upgrade to a T3. If it's cost prohibitive, then I would suggest adding to your existing T1. Talk to your present carrier and enquire about the cost of a T3 and adding on to your existing T1 and compare the two to see which is going to be more cost effective.

"I am currently doing a project for my school networking class.. " gee getting others to do your research may be the quick answer but you are robbing yourself of the skills you are to develop from the exercise rugrat2553 Imagine the power if you knew how to internet search

It is actually a Case Study for my CCNA 3 class, and we were told to use any means possible to get the proposal going. I am not asking for you to tell me what to do but asking for what you think on the ideas mentioned earlier. As for the cables running all over the place, that is only in 2 rooms, the Library and in the Cisco Lab because of the setup of the rooms, the cables are from the drops on the wall to the computers but the desks are arranged in a horse-shoe an we have the practice routers and switches at the end of the desks. We do not do many large transfers, just Re-imaging of all the computers once in a while. Many download sites have been blocked by the Network Admin. Thanks again.