Wireless Access Remains Spotty

Harvard is cracking down on computer users who are hogging bandwidth and blocking their neighbors from logging online. But the effort hasn’t helped some River House residents who still complain that they can’t get a consistent wireless signal from their dorms.

Faculty of Arts and Sciences Computer Services has implemented “User Based Rate Limiting” in the River area—a mechanism that “prevents one or two users who are using a program that consumes large amounts of bandwidth from monopolizing an access point,” according to Computer Services spokeswoman Elizabeth Hess.

The crackdown on bandwidth hogs began after Computer Services announced in September that it had received repeated complaints from students who couldn’t connect wirelessly from their dorms.

Computer Services said at the time that students using programs with high bandwidth requirements “can sporadically overwhelm a wireless network access point.”

Wireless strength has increased marginally since the September siege, River House residents say.

“It’s gotten a little bit better,” said Gianna M. De Caro ’08 of Dunster House. But still, De Caro added, “sometimes it will be out completely or has really slow speed.”

“In my room it’s awful,” Gregory D. Bybee ’07 said in a phone interview from his Winthrop dorm—just moments after he lost his wireless connection to AOL Instant Messenger.

Computer Services officials are aware that their work is not done. “FAS Computer Services is continuing a more comprehensive survey to investigate over-subscribed access points,” wrote Hess. “As resources allow, additional access points are being deployed in key areas.”

Until then, Ethernet cords are the first recourse for students without wireless. But, Bybee said, “the outlets in the room aren’t really well-placed, so you need a long cable that runs around the room.”

He recalled that he and his blockmate had to saw through a wall last year in order to make one room in their suite Ethernet-enabled.

While Hess says “work is ongoing” to add additional access points, progress isn’t fast enough for some Internet-dependent students.

“It’s really sort of shameful for a university that has so many resources and claims to be so technologically advanced to be lagging in such a thing as a wireless,” De Caro said.

—Staff writer Nina L. Vizcarrondo can be reached at nvizcarr@fas.harvard.edu.