Law firm refreshes Melbourne network

in brief Law firm Middletons has replaced its Melbourne network switching infrastructure with Nortel hardware as part of a move to a new office.

Middletons technology services manager Terry Bohan was not immediately available to comment on the rollout, which was completed in late January. A statement issued by Nortel today said the infrastructure will support some 250 users with Wi-Fi and gigabit Ethernet links. Middletons is using Nortel's 5510 and 2360 switches, along with wireless access points.

"We were pulling apart a network that hasn't seen much disruption in 17 years and putting it back together in 48 hours, so we took the opportunity to upgrade the core infrastructure," Bohan said in Nortel's statement.

"We had to work to very tight timeframes to re-locate the network and configure the mix of new and old equipment, but the equipment we chose made that job much easier than it sounds."

"Murphy's Law -- we had users complaining of login problems almost immediately, but instead of the switches being faulty, we realised the cables weren't plugged in, and had the entire floor up and running again in five minutes," he said.