Re: [school-discuss] Success!

["Dave Prentice" <prentice@instruction.com>]

Doug,
    The fiber lines are trunks from the comm hut outside to the wiring
closets. From there, cat5 goes to the users. I have no experience with
media converters. It sounds like this is beyond my expertise.
Thanks for the info.
Dave Prentice
prentice@instruction.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Doug Loss <drloss@suscom.net>
To: schoolforge-discuss@schoolforge.net
<schoolforge-discuss@schoolforge.net>
Date: Thursday, August 29, 2002 7:34 AM
Subject: Re: [school-discuss] Success!


>Dave Prentice wrote:
>
>>     I have a problem that may run in a similar vein. Last year part
of
>> my school was online. During the summer the building was partially
>> rewired, with some of the old cat5 cables replaced with fiber
optics.
>> However, the contractor didn't finish the job. They left a fiber
optic
>> cable going in and scores of cat5s coming out of several wiring
>> closets, but they never got around to installing switches, hubs, or
>> whatever you want to call them to connect the ins to the outs. That
>> contractor is now gone, and my school is almost completely offline.
>>     Does anybody know if there is a fiber optic NIC I could install
in
>> a freesco, or in anything else for that matter? It may be months
(if
>> ever) before the school district gets around to buying and
installing
>> the switches.
>
>I see others recommending FDDI and GigEthernet NICs for you, but from
your
>description it doesn't seem to me like those would be good solutions.
Are
>the fiber lines situated in such a way that the they would be used as
>trunks between switches and the cat5 would be homeruns to "leaf"
nodes
>(user desktops, servers, etc.), or are they just occasional
replacements
>for the cat5 with no particular plan for the replacement?
>
>Arkian <http://www.arkian.co.kr/kor/html/product_unicom.html> has
>100Base-FX NICs which will put 100 Mbps Ethernet directly over your
fiber
>(assuming it's multimode fiber), as does Alloy
><http://www.alloy.com.au/products/nic.htm>, Transition
><http://www.transition.com/products/nics/efa020x.htm>, Provantage,
><http://www.provantage.com/PR_43152.HTM?TRNT18L> and probably more.
>
>You will probably also need some media converters to get from the
>100Base-FX fiber to 100Base-TX copper to connect to your hubs unless
you
>can find switches that offer both -TX and -FX connections.  In my
>experience those are rare; usually they offer either one or the
other, but
>not both.  Media converters are available from Omnitron
><http://www.omnitron-systems.com/converters/converters.htm>,
Versitron
><http://www.versitron.com/Media-Converters-links.htm>, MiLAN
><http://www.milan.com/converters/c2000.pdf>, Transition
><http://www.transition.com/products/mcon_platform/standalone/fastethe
rnet/e100btxfx05.htm>,
>and many others.
>
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>Doug Loss                 All I want is a warm bed
>Data Network Coordinator  and a kind word and
>Bloomsburg University     unlimited power.
>dloss@bloomu.edu                Ashleigh Brilliant
>
>
>