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The challenge of installing leading-edge cabling throughout ancient buildings, some of which date back to the late 13th Century, without any cable routes showing to College staff and students, is not often faced by cabling vendors and installers. This is, however, exactly the brief presented by Hertford College to Molex Premise Networks and MaxResponse, the local company contracted to carry out the work; to install voice and data outlets in each of the 190 student rooms before the start of the new academic year in October 1999.
This project is typical of the forward-thinking nature of Hertford College, which until the 1960’s was one of the smallest and poorest of Oxford’s men’s colleges. A remarkable transformation began at the college in the late 1960’s – the redistribution of wealth from the richer to the poorer colleges and some early appeals gave Hertford a financial basis for expansion.
An innovative undergraduate recruitment policy attracted high-flying sixth-formers from the newly established comprehensive schools that had no previous connections with Oxford University. Academic standards rose rapidly and rose again when Hertford became one of the first men’s colleges to admit women in the 1970’s. By that time the new Holywell Quadrangle had been built and the next twenty years saw the erection of two further buildings, enabling Hertford to become one of the few Oxford colleges able to offer accommodation to all its undergraduates, who now number approximately 350.
Hertford College Provides Students with Leading-edge Technology
The provision of accommodation to all undergraduates has now moved several steps further with the installation of telephone and internet access points in all student rooms. All other student areas within the College, from the Common Rooms to the libraries, were equipped with voice and data points. In total, 290 data points and 230 telephone points needed to be installed at the College over the summer months.
Technology-enabled Student Expectations Create Demand
Greg Jennings, IT Manager at Hertford College, Oxford, commented, „On arrival, students expect to be able to link up to the internet using standard modems but previously we’ve had to install data points in their rooms on demand. For example at the start of 1998/99 academic year, 47 of the total 115 new students asked for an internet access point to be installed in their room within the first week of term. Clearly this situation needed to be resolved, so the decision was taken to perform the installations in each of the rooms prior to the arrival of the new students this year. We asked MaxResponse, a local company with experience of working with Oxford Colleges, to carry out the work.”
Jennings continued, „Over recent years we have experienced a rising number of undergraduates arriving with their own PCs. Last year 30 percent of Oxford undergraduate students owned PCs, with the number at Hertford being slightly higher at 40 percent.
This rise is a reflection of the working practices of today’s students, with more and more teaching material being made available as Web pages and students using the Internet as a key research tool. It is extremely important for students to have Internet access from their desks.”
As the primary contractor, MaxResponse specified the whole installation and also selected and managed the cabling sub-contractor, TCS Cabling Installations. MaxResponse provided the interface between the College and TCS, ensuring that there was one point of contact to which both the College and TCS could refer.
John Lewis, Director, MaxResponse, explained, „Our job was to install 14 cabling cabinets throughout the various buildings on the College campus. We placed five in the Old Building, five in the New Quadrangles and four in the Holywell Quadrangles.
MaxResponse enlisted the services of TCS Cabling Installations because of their experience with listed buildings and other Oxford colleges. Founded in 1996, TCS is a dedicated supplier of cabling solutions and services to a wide range of end users, and specializes in structured, voice and fibre optic cabling. The choice of Molex Premise Networks cabling was recommended by TCS before being endorsed by MaxResponse and Hertford College IT department.
Molex Cabling Recommended by Suppliers
Danny Tomassi, TCS Account Manager, explained the choice of Molex cabling, „We always recommend Molex cabling products for many reasons, primarily because it’s easy to terminate and the modules and panels are of a high quality with a good finish. On a technical level, we have confidence in the Molex cable products because they are tested to ensure the highest level of integrity and through experience we’ve found them to deliver outstanding performance and durability. We need to use high quality cabling and interconnection products like Molex’s to achieve the aim of an error-free solution. From their integrated copper cabling and fibre optics to the office outlets, patch panels and racks, Molex delivers compliance with all applicable industry standards – this gives us the confidence we need to recommend Molex cabling to customers such as Hertford College.”
Tomassi continued, „With the demands of the high speed protocols such as Gigabit Ethernet the capabilities of Category 5 cabling are exceeded. We needed to use cabling which would ensure high speed system support, so the Molex PowerCat solution was the obvious choice.”
„I have complete confidence in the Molex cabling installed at the College,” said Jennings. „Molex Premise Networks has a fine reputation, which, backed up by Molex’s generous lifetime product guarantee, means that I can rest assured that the finest quality cabling has been used and that any repairs or replacements needed; will be carried out without complications.”
Molex PowerCat Cable Exceeds Standards Requirements
For this installation at Hertford College, Molex’s PowerCat solution was used since it exceeds the requirements of Category 5E for assured high speed system support. In addition, since the PowerCat range is based on thePowerSum principle of crosstalk measurement and testing, it facilitates the use of multiple pairs for parallel transmission within 100ohm 4 pair cable. Using this method, the crosstalk measurement is significantly more stringent than the standard Category 5 test criteria, resulting in this range offering positive ACR at 200MHz in line with emerging standards, and it provides transmission performance which exceeds the proposed Category 5E link criteria.
