Wireless Network Deployment Solution for a Middle School in Hubei

With the widespread use of the internet, more and more schools are beginning to value the impact of the network on the quality of teaching. High-quality wireless networks provide teachers and students with a more convenient teaching environment. Teachers can access teaching resources, download courseware, videos, and other multimedia materials anytime and anywhere through wireless networks. Students can also use wireless networks for online learning, information queries, and online group discussions, which not only enriches classroom content but also improves learning efficiency.

Customer Background

A middle school in Hubei has more than 800 teachers and students. The main building consists of three teaching buildings: the south, north, and side buildings, equipped with classrooms, offices, and laboratories. The main building has 6 floors and is interconnected through the side building on the west side, which has a total of 3 floors. The east side building has 6 floors and is used as classrooms.

Due to the simple and long-standing campus network, in order to ensure the stability and high-speed operation of the cloud campus, this wireless network upgrade project is carried out. It is hoped that after the project is completed, every floor of the main building, side building, and east side building will have stable network signals, and the corridor signals will be covered by indoor wireless APs.

Wireless AP Status Analysis

With the rapid development of computer and network technology, information technology and applications have increasingly penetrated and dominated various aspects of human life. Correspondingly, the amount of data and application demands have also shown a steady and rapid growth. In the current situation where WLAN technology is widely used, traditional wireless devices using 802.11b, 802.11a, and 802.11g technologies can no longer meet the demands of the new business and application models of the WEB2.0 era for wireless network transmission capabilities. Therefore, the new favorite of WLAN, the 802.11ac technology system with more optimized protocol management and control mechanisms, has emerged.

In terms of network deployment models, the current industry mainly uses two solutions for deploying wireless networks: FAT-AP (full-featured AP) and "FIT-AP+AC (thin AP+wireless controller)". The distributed network model of FAT-AP+wired switch belongs to the traditional WLAN network, which is generally built for a small number of mobile users in small businesses or homes. With the continuous emergence of network construction and group network problems, a more flexible new WLAN network architecture, FIT-AP+AC centralized WLAN management model, has gradually come into people's view.

The FIT-AP+AC model has redefined the functions of the equipment. The wireless controller is responsible for wireless network access control, forwarding and statistics, AP configuration monitoring, roaming management, AP network management proxy, and security control. The FIT AP is responsible for 802.11 packet encryption and decryption, 802.11 PHY functions, accepting wireless controller management, and RF air interface statistics, etc. This network model can manage and configure all APs through the wireless controller (Wireless Controller), and it has efficient network performance, scalability, and improved network security.

Solution

Based on the analysis of the above wireless network deployment models, this project will adopt the more mature "FIT-AP+AC (thin AP+wireless controller)" WLAN wireless network deployment model for network deployment, in which all wireless APs will use high-performance AP devices that support 802.11ac. Each cloud classroom is designed to accommodate 100 students simultaneously and ensure a good user experience when transmitting high-definition images, cloud courseware, high-definition videos, and other applications.

For security considerations, an H3C ACG device will be placed at the exit to provide control, management, and audit functions for internal access to the external network. A firewall security card will be deployed on the core switch to achieve network attack defense, security isolation between different services in the internal network, and access control between various applications.

The specific coverage plan for the wireless network construction is as follows: one wireless wall-mounted AP will be placed in each classroom, one panel AP in each office and laboratory, and a 10-gigabit PoE switch will be used to provide remote Ethernet line power supply. The network cable will use Category 6 or higher twisted pair cable, and 3-5 meters of excess cable will be reserved at the AP end (for later expansion, wireless optimization, etc.).

Product Recommendations

Based on the on-site survey and communication with the school's teachers, the following statistics for the use of PoE switches and wireless APs are recommended:

A total of 9 PoE switches will be placed in the three buildings to power all wireless APs, and 10-gigabit optical fibers will be used to interconnect with the core switch.

60 indoor panel APs are recommended, with the model recommended: H3C WA4320H-ACN (for offices).

65 indoor high-density wall-mounted APs are recommended, with the model recommended: H3C WA4330-ACN.

3 indoor wall-mounted APs are recommended, with the model recommended: H3C WA4320I-ACN.

AP Placement and Routing Connection Diagram:

User Access Authentication and Wireless Network Management

There are currently two types of user access authentication methods for wireless networks: 802.1x and Web Portal authentication. 802.1x authentication can achieve mandatory authentication based on wireless ports or terminal MAC, with high security, and it belongs to the mode of accessing the wireless network after authentication, which is suitable for fixed office scenarios with higher security requirements. Web Portal authentication can achieve traffic-triggered authentication based on IP addresses, which belongs to the mode of accessing the wireless network first and triggering authentication when exiting the controller.

Both of the above methods require the support of a user access authentication management server. This project recommends using the H3C iMC intelligent management center platform, which can be paired with the iMC-WSM component to achieve the integrated management of the school's wireless network system; it can also be paired with the iMC-EIA component (and inode client software) to achieve unified authentication management of office wireless terminals. In addition, an H3C authentication server will be deployed in the core machine room to authenticate school personnel.

Project Highlights

The core switch uses a design without a single point of failure, and all key components, such as the main control board, switching network, power supply, and fans, use redundant design; the passive backplane avoids a single point of failure in the case; all single boards and power supply modules support hot-swappable functions, which can run stably for a long time in harsh environments, achieving 99.999% telecommunication-level reliability, ensuring long-term stable operation of user services.

In addition, plug-in devices generally provide dual power supply reliability design, and all key components can be redundantly deployed, including power supplies, engines, interface boards, and business boards, greatly improving their reliability. When all key components are redundantly deployed, it is equivalent to two devices working at the same time and can share the load. Moreover, all plug-ins support hot-swapping, which greatly reduces the time to replace devices in case of failure.

Furthermore, all H3C SecBlade business modules use the industry's most advanced multi-core multi-threaded CPU+ASIC+FPGA high-performance, distributed hardware architecture. This distributed hardware architecture ensures that all businesses can be processed in parallel in the first place. When the SecBlade business modules transfer data with the switch and other plug-ins through the switch Crossbar bus, the data bandwidth is above 10Gbps, which greatly ensures its transmission and forwarding rate.

In addition, it has convenient manageability, each plug-in can be independently managed through the WEB interface, and can also be uniformly managed by the switch with other business boards. The status of different plug-ins can be uniformly displayed based on the main control board, and the plug-ins can be uniformly managed through the main control board.

In summary, through this campus wireless network construction, not only has the teaching efficiency been improved, interactive teaching has been promoted, resource sharing has been realized, but network security has also been enhanced, the school's image has been improved, and a foundation has been laid for future development.