Forecast 2014: Boost your mobile bandwidth

Source: Computerworld Forecast survey; base: 221 IT executive respondents; June 2013

Among Armstrong's nearly 7,400 undergraduate and graduate students and almost 600 faculty and staff members, Howard says he has seen a rise in individuals using not just single devices, but combinations of smartphones, tablets, laptops and, in the residence halls, gaming stations.

So for six months, starting during the school year late last year, Howard and his team set about ripping and replacing all elements of the wireless and wired LAN, as well as the pipes between buildings and out to the Internet. He says, only half-jokingly, that because school was in session, it was like being a magician who pulls the tablecloth off of a table without upsetting the dinner plates.

One of the team's first initiatives was to increase the coverage and density of the wireless LAN. The 802.11 a/b/g access points had been clustered so much that they were starting to experience diminishing returns, suffering interference and other scaling issues.

The new wireless LAN has to serve students equally well indoors and out. The IT team upgraded to 802.11n access points, which are capable of supporting 30 to 40 clients each, compared with 20 to 30 for the old access points, and installed 60% more access points campuswide -- eliminating the access point bottlenecks in a single stroke.