IT 212 Final Project

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Southern New Hampshire University *

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212

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Information Systems

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Dec 6, 2023

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docx

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1 IT-212 7-1 Final Project Shane Mallory SNHU Professor Baier 4/10/2023 [Institutional Affiliation(s)]
IT-212 Final Project As a new employee hired during the company’s Future Vision Program, I have been asked to report on my suggestions and recommendations for the network setup at the new office in Fayetteville, NC. This report will describe all of the “must-haves” that this network will require as well as any key considerations or additional resources necessary to meet the office’s needs. This will include elements such as IP range, communications media, data transport, hardware and software, LAN topology, and ISP considerations, amongst others. By the end of this report, the new office in Fayetteville, NC will have a base plan about how their network should be established with cost-effectiveness and troubleshooting efficiency in mind. For this new office, I believe that the first and perhaps the most important place to start will be choosing the ISP for the location, one that will provide the necessary speed and bandwidth for the building. After some research, I have determined that many ISPs in this area do not support the speeds necessary to service the new office. The only viable option appears to be Spectrum Business, as they support download speeds up to 1,000 Mbps using a fiber optic cable connection with unlimited bandwidth. One perk of choosing Spectrum as the ISP is that they do not require a contract to receive services, so if this Internet does not work out as intended or perhaps a better option opens up in the future, switching will be much easier and cheaper. Once the ISP has been established the next step would be to configure the necessary hardware to supply the building with an internet connection. Firstly, a modem should be set up to provide an internet connection throughout the building, then connected to the modem should be a firewall with a basic packet filtering configuration. Since this new office is relatively small, only containing around 50 employees, this configuration will suffice without sacrificing internet speed or reliability. The next step would be to wire the building with the necessary wires and wall ports, such as plenty of network and electrical outlets. When wiring the building the necessary precautions must be made when wiring through plenum or riser spaces, and the proper cable should be used for each area to minimize fire hazards. Once the building is wired correctly the next step would be to install some routers and switches to enable all devices in the building to have access to an internet connection. The routers will help to boost the network signal throughout the building, and the switches will help with wiring and enable all of the office’s devices to communicate with one another. I believe a cost-effective layer 2 unmanaged switch would be the most effective for this situation as a switch operating on layer 2 of the OSI Model would supply all of the needs of this small office while minimizing costs. Along with the routers and switches, a server will also be installed onto the LAN and connected to a switch along with the router, modem, and all other devices in the building. Having numerous connection points will help with troubleshooting if the network goes down as there will not be one singular error point. Having the necessary firewalls set up will be paramount in keeping the LAN within this office space secure. I would also recommend careful consideration when setting up the WIFI antennas within the office, being sure not to leak out any signal outside of the building using omnidirectional and directional antennas where needed. For the employee’s workstations, I would recommend the following components: CPU: Intel I3 processor or higher with integrated graphics RAM: 8GB or higher Storage: 500GB hard drive or higher For the server workstations, the minimum requirements should be. CPU: 1.4 GHz 64-Bit processor
RAM: 512 MB Storage 32GB or more I would also recommend installing a print server to allow the Fayetteville and Albany office’s printers to communicate with one another and print items between locations. Also ensuring that the offices are using the same brand and model of printer will keep compatibility issues to a minimum and make driver updates easier and faster. The final steps would be to set up all desktops, laptops, printers, VoIP phones, etc. the employees will need to have these configured to the network to ensure the employees can start their work immediately. For the IP address range, I believe that for this small office building a class C IP range will suffice, which offers a range between 192-223 addresses. Having this range, in particular, will help the devices within this office communicate with one another as well as any other office buildings the company may own. Next, we can shift our focus to the software and hardware requirements of this new office. Since this office must communicate with all of the other locations as well as any employees that work from home or travel often, I would recommend a conference application to make this process efficient and cost-effective. I would recommend using Zoom as the conference and meeting application as it has supported integration in many Google and Microsoft applications and also supports web and mobile users. The layout of the Zoom software is simple and easy to understand and has become a household name during the recent COVID-19 outbreak, Zoom is also the PCMAG’s Editor’s Choice for conference software. For the mode of transport, I would strongly recommend using full-duplex as it enables data and communication streams to transmit in both directions at the same time, allowing for uninterrupted data transmissions. This will also benefit the need for printing at the Albany headquarters, and since all locations are on the same IP range all printers, servers, and computers will be able to communicate with one another seamlessly. Then by using RDP and a VPN tunnel
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