Commander in university network rollout

Integrator Commander is rolling out a high-speed network at Queensland’s James Cook University (JCU) to deliver video, IP telephony and services to students and staff across multiple campuses.

JCU is investing $2 million in the network upgrade, which involved the rollout of Nortel’s 10-Gigabit 8600 Ethernet routing switch; its routing switch 5530 for one-to 10-Gigabit distribution and routing switch 5520 for 10/100/1000 Megabit edge switches with power-over-Ethernet (PoE).

The rollout provides 8500 Ethernet ports with PoE across all campuses, Nortel said.

Commander was chosen by JCU after a round of technical presentations identified a 10-Gigabit network as the right choice, Nortel said.

Carl Van Wyk, communications infrastructure manager at James Cook University, said the university was considering a wholesale migration to IP telephony next year with the network presenting an open migration path to the technology.

“Our existing PABX is nearing the end of its life, so a move to IP telephony is the logical next step in our network evolution. One of the benefits of Nortel’s telephony-enabled solution is that it gives us the platform we need for a straight migration to IP telephony without having to reinvest in network infrastructure.

“Since our network ports provide PoE, it’s simply a matter of switching on IP services at the core and connecting IP handsets at the desktop,” he said.

The first phase of the network deployment would be completed in September with the full network expected to go live early next year.