If you are at work, follow the procedures set up by your school for accessing tech support. Please be advised that some schools do not have daily tech support and you may have to wait several days to get your laptop back. You could check with your resident "expert" to see if they are able to support you.

The Help Desk is only available during regular school hours. If you are experiencing difficulty with your computer at home, you will have to wait until you return to school to have the problem addressed. You may be able to access support in summer months from the Help Desk.

If you have a Mac laptop, help is available, however, you should be advised that your problem may not be solved as your computer has been imaged by the CBE and is not a commercial product. More information can be accessed at Apple's online support site or downloaded here (pdf) or you can find contact information at www.apple.com/contact/phone_contacts.htm

Blue cables run throughout the school – better known as Ethernet cables. Workstations, printers, servers, etc. all connect to blue cables. Switch equipment connects network devices to: the school network, the CBE network and the Internet. These blue cables create a secure network. Ethernet cables provide dedicated connections so that the performance of your laptop is not affected by the number of computers accessing the network nor does it depend on the location of computers. The speed your data travels on an Ethernet connection is much higher (faster) than on wireless connections.

Wireless connections work with antennas that broadcast a signal. This signal is shared between the devices and the connection speed depends on the proximity of the device to the antenna and the number of people accessing the wireless network at any given time. Therefore performance will fluctuate and is much lower (slower) than on a dedicated Ethernet cable.

Wireless technology is an enhancement (not replacement) to wired technology and is much less robust than wired technology. Wireless connections are not appropriate for use with bandwidth intensive applications that are graphic and audio intensive such as: movies, video streaming, CAD, etc.

Wireless access is insecure and is susceptible to eaves dropping even with WEP encryption it takes about one minute to crack encryption keys and gain access to information being transmitted. It is therefore not recommended to use administrative applications such as SIRS, e-mail, etc, over wireless.