The Cabling Blog Archives for March 2010

In the mode of Mythbusters, The Uptime Institute has taken issue with the belief, apparently commonly held, that the TIA-942 standard is a valid guideline for its (The Uptime Institute's) Data Center Tier classification system.

We talked to Jonathan Jew, one of TIA-942's creators and a co-editor of the still-in-development TIA-942-A specifications, about the Institute's claims. He didn't disagree.

Remember that part of The Uptime Institute's business is to provide training through which design professionals can achieve the organization's Accredited Tier Designer (ATD) designation. It's not in the Institute's business interests to let everyone believe they can buy a standard from TIA and "Voila!" they can follow its script to design a Tier IV data center. Not to mention anything in the way of altruism -- you know, actually caring about designs being done correctly so data centers perform at the extremely high levels their owners require.

It's not too different from the structured cabling industry. One can't just read a standard and have the in-depth knowledge necessary to design a complex layer-one infrastructure system for an organization's dynamic network. Although, I bet many of you have seen a cabling system or two that looked like their designers gave it a try.

A different but familiar form of wireless communication is making its way into more and more building facilities. 802.11-based wireless local area networks (LANs) have long been recognized as a complementary technology to wired networks within buildings. An organization installing or upgrading its wireless LAN is not news. What is news, or at least a growing trend, is for facilities to install in-building wireless systems that support the nation’s cellular or personal communications service (PCS) networks.

An article in an upcoming issue of Cabling Installation & Maintenance magazine will delve into detail on the topic, including information about the Wired for Wireless product line that CommScope recently introduced for exactly that application—-in-building personal wireless service.

One tidbit of information that was “left on the cutting room floor” from the upcoming article is the success story of a distributed antenna system (DAS) installation project at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. The airport is about a 5.8-million square-foot facility. ADC’s vice president of product management John Spindler, who is quoted in the article, recalls the Hartsfield-Jackson project. “Even at 5.8-million square feet the job was completed in a span of about 12 weeks. It was properly planned up front and all security clearances had been arranged.

“There are more than 700 antennas, 8 kilometers of fiber-optic cable, 65 kilometers of twisted-pair cable, and 16 kilometers of coaxial cable,” in the facility. Spindler adds, “It might not be a typical installation because it’s such a large facility, but it is a good example of the kinds of challenges that can be faced,” when installing indoor DAS systems. It’s also a good example of what can be accomplished with such systems.

As is the case with in-building wireless LANs, there are a lot of wires (and sometimes fibers, for that matter) behind those wireless communications systems. CommScope’s new system includes the Heliax ½-inch coaxial cable that comes from the Andrew wireless communications brand. ADC emphasizes that its InterReach systems can leverage existing coaxial, twisted-pair, and multimode fiber-optic cabling that may already reside in a building in which a DAS will be installed.

The next time you are in a conference room or lobby and can’t get service on your wireless device, look at it as an opportunity to accommodate the building you’re in to better serve its customers.

Are you familiar with the Large Hadron Collider? I knew nothing about it until I read Dan Brown's Angels and Demons. Then it started popping up in the news all the time, so it seemed. The LHC -- I don't know if that's its real abbreviation or not -- is a particle accelerator that was built and is operated by the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN. (Side note: According to credible sources such as Dan Brown and Wikipedia, CERN invented the Internet. Not DARPA. Not Al Gore. CERN.)

Those who have followed the Collider's history are familiar with a recent shutdown that took it offline for several months. Within the past few weeks CERN brought it back online and has had great expectations of it. However, news got out today that, perhaps among other components, copper connectors will be responsible for the Large Hadron Collider going offline at the end of next year for what's likely to be a year's worth of repair.

I learned about this through Australian news agency The Age, which quoted a CERN scientist as saying, "We are pushing technologies towards their limits." It looks like the collider will run at half power between now and the end of next year when the repairs begin.

Now I'm not a gambling man, but I'd be willing to bet a dinner that the copper connectors that are the collider's weak links are not of the RJ-45 variety. So no snarky comments saying this wouldn't have happened if they'd used fiber - or anything like that.

I just couldn't resist passing this info along, as a high-profile example of the criticality of a "little thing" like a connector. Our industry lives and breathes the importance of high-technology systems' infrastructure components. Sometimes the rest of the world gets wind of that importance as well.

Government Computer News (GCN) is reporting that cabling-integration firm Automated Systems Design (ASD) was contracted to install the cabling for some 500 temporary offices for the Census Bureau as that government entity ramped up for its data-collection efforts this year--the promotion of which has even included a SuperBowl ad.

The GCN report details the projects' multiple challenges, including geographic dispersion, short turnaround times, and diversity of office space. "Some buildings were modern, while others were historic structures with tricky floor plans for running cable," GCN reported.

What caught my eye was the plan for the local offices and their information-technology infrastructures to be uninstalled once workers complete their data collection.

If you've been around long enough you've heard me rant about abandoned cable. Then rant again. And again.

Automated Systems Design's (ASD) vice president of sales Barbara Eskew, who is quoted in the GCN report, told me the government did not contract with her firm to remove the cabling systems once the Census project is over. She was given a "wait-and-see" response rather than including removal in the installation contract. Now that doesn't necessarily mean the Census Bureau will be guilty of abandoning the cable from its 500-plus temporary offices. It may use other labor to do the removal, or call ASD later in the year and schedule the appropriate removal.

Heck, the bureau may decide to tag the cable for future use. Census data is taken every 10 years, isn't it?