Case Study – Halifax Regional School Board

Partner: Graybar Canada
Graybar Project Lead: Sean Sullivan, Account Manager (Comm/Data)

May 2014

Current Situation and Issue:
As the largest school board in the province, the Halifax Regional School Board aims to keep their technology up-to-date. With many classrooms and common areas equipped with projector systems, there is a lot of turnover with these systems as the technology continuously evolves.

That turnover involves pulling new cables including CAT5e and/or CAT6 through ceilings and walls to ensure the correct connectivity while being out of sight. It also meant that the end users had to purchase bulky cable assemblies each time a projector was upgraded. Aside from material costs, the labor costs associated with pulling the cables was adding up. This, coupled with the time lost for equipment installation, multiplied by several schools in the Board, was becoming increasingly costly and inefficient.

Solution:
Graybar Canada worked with their vendor partner Muxlab in determining the right long term solution for the School Board. Muxlab VGA Baluns were installed in the classrooms and other areas with projectors.
Used in pairs, the VGA Balun II is used in home or commercial applications as a smart, fast and cost-effective means of connecting VGA displays and projectors using twisted pair instead of coax cable. Ideal for classrooms, lecture halls, auditoriums, retail kiosks, video information displays, on-line advertising, tradeshows, hotel and convention centers, mobile presentations, collaborative viewing.
Now, no matter what the technology used or cable outlet needed, the Muxlab VGA Balun II will allow the user to just ‘plug and play’.

Result:
As a result of the solution, the adaptor will remain and the schools will see a quick payback in their investment. No more pulling cable through the ceilings. The Muxlab product is ‘futureproof’, making it useable with new projectors when current technology becomes obsolete