Despite the constant muttering of complaints from students about bad Wi-Fi, Greg Harvill, Central’s director of networks and operations, said that Central’s network is as good, if not better, than similar state schools in the northwest such as the University of Washington and Washington State University.

Over the past eight years, Central has been working on upgrading the campus network by implementing a 10 gigabit high-speed, fiber-optic backbone.

Busier buildings such as the SURC and the library were initially prioritized with the 10 gigabit upgrade while buildings with less student use are still running on the older 10/100 megabyte speeds.

At this moment in time, the project is 70 percent complete and estimated to be completed in the next four to six years.

Over the summer, Central’s Wi-Fi received a network name change and became CWU-Wildcats.

Despite the flyers, emails and other notifications informing students of this change, Harvill said that the majority of people are still using the public Wi-Fi connection.

The public connection, which anyone can log on to without needing any login information, is 32 times slower than CWU-Wildcats.

For anyone experiencing slow speeds, a simple one-step solution would be to double check the network they’re using and then login to the proper Wi-Fi network using a student username and password.

Additionally, student complaints about slow internet usually correspond directly to the location and time of day that they are connected to Wi-Fi.

Highly-saturated areas, like the SURC, experience peak hours between 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. to 3 p.m. Resident halls, on the other hand, peak between the hours of 3 p.m. and midnight.

The wireless access points (WAP) that are situated throughout each building and provide a Wi-Fi signal designed to support the connections of around 40 users. However, during these peak hours, the WAPs are put under the stress of up to 80 connections.

To combat this overwhelming issue, Harvill is working to pinpoint the prime Wi-Fi locations and install additional WAPs to support the abundance of users.

When issues do occur, it’s up to Harvill’s networks and operations team, made up of 15 people, to identify and solve them.

For example, the massive network outage that occurred three weeks ago and left students stranded from the internet for most of the morning was not an internal issue, but in fact, an act of vandalism that occurred west of Cle Elum.

A major fiber cable that connects Ellensburg’s network to its larger provider in Seattle was physically cut.

Initially, the public was told it was a tree trimming accident, but the nature of the incident and the time at which it occurred during the middle of the night, hinted suspiciously towards vandalism.

In working to solve connection issues, students are often the biggest source of information and assistance.

Harvill encouraged any students who experience internet or Wi-Fi issues to report them to the Central Service Desk by calling (509)963-2001 or to troubleshoot the issue online via the Web Self Service link.

“Most times, we aren’t aware of issues until they are reported. It helps us immensely when students are proactive in reporting connection issues so that our team can work on fixing them as quickly as possible,” Harvill said.