Upgrading and enhancing existing networking

Surftec is now a Netgear Partner and is able to offer educational establishments discounts on Netgear equipment.

Netgear equipment and switches have stood the test of time at Surftec installations, whilst other makes have suffered from power supply failures, faulty switching and so on, the installed Netgear products are still working, this coupled with their affordable prices makes them a winner in education.

Surftec promote only a couple of models of switch, our normal stacked, managed gigabit switch, or our bottom of the range 10/100 unmanaged 24 port switch.

Netgear FMS726S 24 x 10/100 Port 2 x 1Gbps Fibre module slots (opt) or 2 x 1Gbps Copper Ports Layer 2 Managed Stacking Switch with 16Gbps backbone £265.00 Next Day Netgear FMS726 24 x 10/100 Port 2 x 1Gbps Fibre module slots (opt) or 2 x 1Gbps Copper Ports Layer 2 Managed £190.00 Next Day Netgear AGM721F 1Gbps (only) Fibre Module, up to 2 can be fitted to FMS726S. £76.00 Next Day

Installing and replacing wireless networks

Surftec are now able to install large wireless networks from simple infant school installations which often only require two or three access points, to large secondary school installations which include Quality of Service (QoS) and extended antennas to cover large areas such as the school playing fields.

Our choice of equipment is based around Netgear again, who offer both very affordable home/small business class equipment suitable for primary schools, up to business class equipment which would be used at more demanding secondary school installations.

The business class devices also offer PoE (Power over Ethernet) which removes the need to have additional electrical sockets installed, instead power is supplied from the schools data cabinets across the existing network cables.

It is also possible to install access points in places where CAT cable has not been installed, these access points can act as bridges, and repeaters:

• Bridges can be used to link buildings, only suitable for small network segments, such as a primary school with an external semi-perminent classroom, to avoid the expense of installing fibre.
• Repeaters are used to boost wireless coverage in areas where it would be costly to install an additional wired network point.

It is important to remember access points which act as repeaters which do not have a CAT network cable wired to them must be installed close to a power point as PoE cannot be used.

Netgear WG602 802.11g - 54Mbps Supports Bridge and Repeater modes £47.00 Next Day Netgear WG302 802.11g - 54Mbps (108Mbps in Turbo Mode) Supports Bridge and Repeater modes Supports PoE (Power over Ethernet). £170.00 Next Day