Texas School District Utilizes D-Link® Solutions to Upgrade Network and Increase Security

D-Link IP Cameras, Switches and Access Points Enhance Wireless Flexibility and Campus-Wide Security for Joaquin Independent School District

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Jun 25, 2015, 06:15 ET

FOUNTAIN VALLEY, Calif., June 25, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- When the Joaquin Independent School District (Joaquin ISD) realized their 10/100 infrastructure was no match for the district's growing network demand, they turned to D-Link to deliver a comprehensive solution for greater functionality and increased campus-wide security. On its two-square-mile campus, the K-12 school district has three campuses, serving upwards of 750 students annually, with a goal to promote educational excellence, in part by providing access to the Internet and computer technology to all students and teachers.

"When I started with Joaquin ISD, there were a lot of issues. Our old mix of switches kept locking up and had to be restarted – almost every day – and they didn't offer any Layer 2 or Layer 3 features," said Landon Oliver, technology network administrator and director, Joaquin ISD. "Our old wireless infrastructure was comprised of just Linksys^® consumer access points. We had no VLANs, no multicasting options and everything was just on one big wide-open network."

Joaquin ISD's network needed to support over 800 PCs and about 500 mobile devices, which included a notebook, tablet and personal device for every teacher, as well as student traffic. Joaquin ISD was also concerned about security – without money in the budget for a law enforcement team; the district had to devise its own school security. Therefore, Joaquin ISD wanted to install a full IP Surveillance solution – enabling security cameras to provide the necessary eyes on the ground.

"I chose D-Link because they offered me everything I needed and nobody else offered me more for such an affordable price," Oliver said. "D-Link offered all the warranties and strong equipment at nearly half the price as their larger competitors."

Joaquin ISD installed a mix of D-Link IP surveillance cameras, networking gear and wireless infrastructure, including the DGS-3120 Series switches which support physical stacking, multicast and enhanced security, making them an ideal Gigabit access layer solution. The district now enjoys Gigabit connections from PC to server and has been able to increase its SAN storage capabilities for fast data transfers of very large files. Since Oliver was unfamiliar with D-Link, he only purchased four switches for his main MDF to start. When he witnessed how well they worked, he started replacing more switches in batches over time and eventually did a whole network flip. Three years later, Joaquin's ISD's network has slowly grown into the workhorse it is today – running 80 D-Link switches and D-Link's full wireless infrastructure with about 80 access points.

"D-Link definitely honors its lifetime warranty and offers phenomenal support. Their equipment is also about 40 to 70 percent less than large competitors," Oliver explained. "It would have been foolish not to go with them. Another reason I really trust D-Link is that they've never tried to sell me something I don't need. It's hard to find a company that is so honest."

After upgrading his core network, Oliver immediately launched a full-scale camera upgrade. D-Link assisted the process by providing a standalone IP camera as a trial. "It was everything I was looking for," said Oliver. "It had an absolutely gorgeous picture, the bandwidth was low, and it was very price-worthy. Since then, I have slowly been upgrading and I've gone from about 80 cameras to about 130 cameras – they're perfect."

Today, Joaquin ISD's network supports nearly 800 LAN connections, approximately 400 wireless connections, 170 IP Surveillance cameras, 80 new IP phones, an all-new public Wi-Fi and an abundance of virtual machines, which have a reputation for hogging bandwidth.

"After I completed our major network upgrade, I was proud that 99.9 percent of my entire network infrastructure was from D-Link," Oliver added. "There are eight or nine schools in the surrounding area and I'm proud to say that I probably have the strongest network out of everybody. We have one incredible network. It simply doesn't go down – it always works."

For more information about D-Link's IP surveillance solutions and its complete line of business solutions, visit www.dlink.com.

About D-Link
D-Link is the global leader in connectivity for home, small business, mid-to large-sized enterprise environments, and service providers. An award-winning designer, developer, and manufacturer, D-Link implements and supports unified network solutions that integrate capabilities in switching, wireless, broadband, storage, IP Surveillance, and cloud-based network management. For more information visit us.dlink.com, or connect with D-Link on LinkedIn (http://www.linkedin.com/company/d-link), Spiceworks (http://community.spiceworks.com/networking/d-link) and the D-Link Blog (http://businessblog.us.dlink.com/).

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