Presentation by Al Baldwin, Computer Services and Networking

This week Al Baldwin gave a presentation on wireless networks, the technology behind frequencies and interference. He covered the more popular 2.4GHz bandwidth spectrum and the ever-increasing issues that plague this bandwidth as more and more devices occupy this frequency. Along the lines of 802.11 standards there are essentially 11 usable channels; all are limited for indoor use to a maximum output of 1W. He showed how the 11 channels overlap, why they overlap and how to minimize interference. He gave us a basic design and showed that there are 3 non-overlapping channels. He gave insight to software that could detect and display the wireless networks around one’s home or office and how to use this information to change or modify our own setup to maximize throughput and reduce overlapping energies.

Additionally, he gave a brief overview of data backup. He posed many different questions a business owner might ask about their backup system as well as their recovery system. One thing he points out that many overlook is the fact that while we are creating our backups we must also test the restoration process. If the backup is corrupt so will be the recovery.