[Coworking] Re: Printing - Cloud Solution?

[Jay Smith]

Hello, I'm the IT Manager for our company, we use mainly Sharp MFP's in our 
space, and these machines (as well as others) have the ability to print by 
User number only. When Sharp releases a new printer, they also release the 
Mac/PC and linux printer drivers. They don't work for tablets, and smart 
phones, that's the one down side. But for lap tops and desktops, they work 
just fine. This then allows the center coordinator to pull a report from 
the printer at the end of the month, and simply upload that CSV straight in 
to our Coworking Software and that automatically add's the 
printing/Scanning/Faxing/Copying charges to their monthly invoice. (That 
get auto billed on the first of the month)

We setup a URL that has the printer drivers on them, and our members can 
self install with the help of a 1 page printer driver install guide we 
created.
We have been doing this for the last 5 years, in 5 different locations. 
Seems to work perfectly.

On Tuesday, January 12, 2016 at 5:23:19 AM UTC-8, TatjanaRose wrote:
>
> Hello, I manage The Guild in Bath, which has been running for over 2yrs 
> now. The space is working really well, with us now operating a waiting list 
> for membership, however, one aspect we have always struggled with is 
> printing. When we opened we started leasing a printer from a local company, 
> but we soon discovered that our members who used Mac (majority) were 
> experiencing real difficulties with finding and downloading the drivers. 
> This meant our Front of House was having to spend a significant amount of 
> their time either trying to set the printer up for the members, or printing 
> for  them. 
>
> We recently came across ezeep  and we think this 
> could be a great solution for us.
>
> Have any of you used this service or something similar? if so how did you 
> find the set-up and the day to day management?
>
> Any advice would be greatly appreciated, as we really want to get this 
> right!
>

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[Coworking] IT questions for people that run coworking spaces

[Jay Smith]

Hello everyone. I'm the IT Manager for a coworking company out of 
California. I'm just curious as to what the average internet connection 
speeds are at most of the coworking spaces in this group. Do you find that 
your speeds could be faster, but you don't really have the option to obtain 
more speed at a decent price? Or are your speeds adequate for your members 
needs?

How many of you have a dedicated IT person working for your company that 
you have full access to during the work day? If you don't, do you have an 
IT service that you call when things start to work improperly?

Our slowest location has a 50/20mbps copper connection,
but our fastest location is a 300/300mbps Fiber connection.

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Re: [Coworking] Re: The best wireless routers for a 3500 sq. ft. space

[Jay Smith]

I run a few different networks for coworking spaces, the Unifi system, if 
you don't know much about networks is a GREAT option for what your trying 
to do. They have an easy setup, and can all be done from one computer, once 
the devices are deployed. It sounds like you would need at least 2 WAP 
spread out across your space. I'm in a 5,000 sq. ft. building between 2 
floors, and I run 3 different access points. Both run dual band (2.4GHz + 
5GHz) wireless signals. 2 of the devices are are at each end of the one 
floor, and then I have the 3rd one covering my event space on the floor 
above us. I have on average 40 people working out of this space, and each 
one of them has a minimum of 2 devices. (Laptop and iPhone/Android phone. 
Some even have tablets as well.)

I have used the Unifi system before, and for smaller networks they are 
great. But when you start putting 30+ devices on one access point, they 
tend to bog down and kick users offline. After testing and testing and 
restarting, we ended up going with the Cisco Aironet 1600 autonomous series 
access points. These things are SOLID. You need to have a little knowledge 
of how to set them up, but one they are going, you never have to touch them 
again. I have a few that have been going for almost 8 months straight! They 
are all 10/100/1000mbps, so they are 1Gb ethernet connections back to the 
switch. 
Plus the Cisco guys are in the $400 or less range.

This brings up another point. If your network is on the older side, your 
more then likely running 10/100mbp speeds from your network devices. 
(Firewall, modem, switch). All of the new gear is Gigabit speed (1000mbps) 
or better (fiber). Having a nice fast internet connection, and access 
points with the ability to use gigabit speeds, is useless if your 
firewall/switch's are only rated at 100mbs vs 1000mbs. There is a 
bottleneck created when that happens, and that slows down the network. 
Think of 10/100mb speeds as a 2 lane freeway, 1000mbps would then be a 20 
lane freeway. This also coincides with Ethernet cables. Cat5e vs Cat6e. But 
that's a whole different ball of wax

The building materials of the old mansion that your in, dampen WiFi signals 
extremely well. Think of putting a super heavy moving blanket on the horn 
of a trumpet, the sound still kinda comes out, but it's not clear, and hard 
to hear. Same effect when a WiFi signal is sent through the walls of the 
building your in, they get dampened. So your connection rates will go down, 
and your transfer rates as well. This will result in dropped connections, 
and people getting pissed off because they cant get their work done.

Before spending a ton of money on new access points, you should map out 
where people are working, what walls are between the working areas, and the 
area where the access point(s) are going to be. You may need to run an 
extra Ethernet drop (or 2 or 3 depending) to a new location closer to the 
people that are working to connect your new access points.

The Apple Airport Extremes your using are for home networks, 5-10 devices 
really. They are not built for business class workflows. They simply cant 
handle the packet flow.



On Friday, November 21, 2014 1:56:14 PM UTC-8, @jot wrote:

 Ruckus APs are worth every penny but there is a great alternative that's a 
 little cheaper and much easier to setup.

 You still need a separate router as Alex described but the thing that 
 makes the biggest difference to WiFi is more access points. They just need 
 to be intelligent enough to regulate their signal strength and work 
 together rather than against each other.

 We use 5 Unifi UAP Pro's for a similar size space to yours but depending 
 on the layout 3 would probably be plenty. You can get a three pack of them 
 for less than $1000. They work best with a computer permanently set up as a 
 controller either on your local network or remotely but they're not 
 dependent on it. The software is significantly easier to use than most 
 domestic router software I've used.
  
 I was able to set them up within 15 minutes of unboxing them and they 
 completely transformed the WiFi. It went from a running joke to one issue 
 in six months. That one issue required nothing more than turning the APs 
 off and on again.

 Your Internet connection and/or router will become the bottleneck with 
 these APs. We'd already switched to a leased line and a high spec router by 
 the time we got them so we knew it was the APs causing problems. Now we 
 don't have to really think about the Internet connection, everything else 
 gets more time. We see around 100 devices per day and I'm confident that we 
 could go well above 200 with this set up.

 I'm feeling pretty lucky that they work as well as they do given the price 
 difference. Has anyone had a contrasting experience with Unifi kit?

 Jon



 —
 Jonathan Markwell

 Follow my adventures in space, time and code: 
 http://jot.is/sustainablyindy

 The Skiff: Brighton Coworking