DS3 Goes the Extra Mile

Second, the network spanned a huge geographic area: In addition to connecting the A&M campus itself, the application called for connecting the university campus with 24 different local school districts in the Corpus Christi to San Antonio Gulf coastal area, which spans 200 miles. Most of the network passed through rural communities, with none larger than a few thousand people. Third, the university had tried to implement a distance-learning network previously but failed because of substandard technology and poor implementation, and was skeptical that any solution would meet its needs. Finally, the school was paying for the entire $1.7 million project with grant funds, and wanted a network that could grow with future needs yet not break the bank nor exceed its grant funds.

Enter Plano, Texas-based DS3 Computing Solutions and Orthogon Systems. DS3 is a network systems integrator that helped create the network. Orthogon is a long-distance wireless vendor based in the United Kingdom with a different twist on wireless.

"We use the 5.8-GHz unlicensed radioband and can send signals close to 10 miles," says Philip Bolt, president of the company. This accomplished what the company calls near line-of-sight connections. The products are called OS-Gemini, named so because twin products are required to establish the long-haul radio links between sites.

"It is already providing benefits to the Southeast Texas community. Key to its success is the Orthogon technology, which provides highly reliable connections between sites, was easy to install and is operating flawlessly," says DS3's president Davis Sylvester.

Traditionally, most wireless links cover fairly short distances. The Wi-Fi 802.11 series of radios can only broadcast several hundred feet at best, and other frequencies aren't much better. Certainly, reaching multiple miles is a challenge and requires great technical skill and products that can deal with interference and dispersion of the signal across these distances. Adding to the complexity is that many products use radios that have microwave links. These links require line-of-sight connections, which is a problem in urban areas where tall buildings can block signals.

What makes Orthogon work well in this environment is a combination of technical and implementation factors. First, the company's design engineers have plenty of radio-frequency experience and are able to tune their radios to deliver the highest possible network bandwidth, using more of the radio frequency to carry more data. They use high-output radio transmitters and ultrasensitive radio receivers, multiplying the effective range and throughput of the radio link. Second, they have perfected near line-of-sight technologies, which is useful when buildings and trees block the shortest path between two networks. The engineers use multiple radio transmissions of the same data over the air and descramble the resulting signals, picking the strongest signal to carry the data transmission. The technology scans all available channels and switches to the best signal, finding the least interference with other radio broadcasts.

While Orthogon had the strongest technical solution, DS3 had to sell Texas A&M on the brand before it got the bid, and here's where the story gets interesting. The integrator wound up playing a key role in specifying the technology and causing the university to change its overall direction in deploying its wireless networking infrastructure.

First off, DS3, which is a minority-owned and SBA 8(a) and HubZone-certified corporation, has maintained a long-term trusted relationship selling a wide array of networking and storage products to the university during the past several years, including specifying SANs and other infrastructure projects.

"The university was pushing for Proxim, and thought that they could deliver the goods. But we showed them we could get a little more bandwidth out of Orthogon, and we are able to get 33 Mbits over our links at greater distances than Proxim could provide," Sylvester says.

Second, Orthogon's dishes were smaller and easier to install than the competition's, according to DS3. "We only needed a 4-foot dish for the 38-mile link," Sylvester says. "Proxim would have needed 8- to 10-foot dishes for the shorter hops. Cost standpoint was unacceptable for larger dishes. What else caught our eye was the gear was easy to install. All of their equipment uses Cat 5 cables between their radios and enclosures, so they didn't need special cables coming down their towers, which can add lots of cost to the bid."

What sealed the deal with Orthogon was its response to DS3's request for demos while it was putting together the project plan. "We asked all three of our vendor finalists to bring equipment to us to try out. Orthogon was the only one to show initiative."

Finally, as mentioned, the university had tried to implement a long-haul network before but failed due to performance reasons. "We specified Orthogon to meet their needs," Sylvester says. "While we would have liked to do this network with Fibre, it was too expensive when we began costing out the project last year."

So far, the network is on track to be finished by the end of July, and the connections are working flawlessly. "This is our first experience with Orthogon," Sylvester says. "They showed us some redundancy and meshing technology, and that was very appealing. "Texas A&M's wireless distance network is a model for distance-education programs nationwide."