Network Bandwidth Capacity Tripled

Harvard tripled its computer network's bandwidth two weeks ago in response to greater network usage.

Bandwidth pertains to the network's capacity to move traffic through the computer system. The increase will ensure the network's efficiency, officials said.

Franklin M. Steen, director of computer services for FAS, said the expanded bandwidth is similar to widened roads to ease traffic overflow or broader pipes to allow for faster water flow.

The upgrade will triple the speed of Internet connection from 45 to 155 megabits for the entire Harvard network system, according to Daniel D. Moriarty, assistant provost and chief information officer.

"The needs for bandwidth of the University are constantly increasing," wrote Rick Osterberg '96, database applications specialist for FAS, in an e-mail message. "Increasing our bandwidth is just a way to stay ahead of the demand so that network performance does not suffer."

Steen said the University upgraded the network not just to plan ahead but to accommodate constantly increasing network usage.

"We were getting close to bandwidth limits, so just in time this line has been added to allow [network] growth to continue," Steen said.

Increased network usage means that most computer users will not notice any changes. Osterberg added that Harvard can only control its own network and not the entire Internet.

"This should increase, or at least maintain, network performance for our users," he wrote. "Note, however, that we can only control the performance of our local network."

"We have increased the bandwidth to the Internet," he added. "However, the Internet itself is large and complex, and individual websites may be fast or slow depending on the network conditions between Harvard and them."

The bandwidth expansion will affect the entire Harvard network, including the College, business and medical schools and all Harvard-affiliated hospitals, Moriarty said.

Applications like Napster impede efficient network operation, and some colleges and universities have been forced to ban the popular music-swapping website to prevent prematurely exceeding bandwidth limitations for their networks.

Steen said the expansion of bandwidth is unrelated to Harvard's recent decision not to ban Napster from its network.

"We had originally said that Napster was not affecting our bandwidth," he said. "The whole discussion for Harvard dealt mostly with the illegality of Napster."

And even if Harvard had banned Napster, the upgrade would still have been needed.

"Our network bandwidth needs have been increasing regardless of Napster use, so that we would need this upgrade even if there was no Napster usage," Osterberg wrote.