The rAge 2011 event it is almost a distant memory, but we finally have the data transfer stats from the 2011 outing of the annual NAG LAN.

While most of the highlights have been covered, we were left wondering about the technical side of the LAN this year. So we caught up with the guys over at HP who sponsored networking equipment for the event and got a few interesting statistics out of them.

HP Networking sponsored R2,828,220.00 worth of networking equipment for the event, something to consider next time you drunkenly claim that you’re willing to organise a 2,200 man LAN.

If you’re the networking type, you’ll probably be interested to learn that the equipment sponsored by HP included HP 5406 switches used as the main core switches of the event, with 3500-24Gyl series switches handling the distribution of the network. Users plugged themselves into 3500-24 and 3500-48 switches to round things off nicely.

The backbone of the network consisted of three fibre links. The main backbone connection between the upstairs and downstairs LAN section operated at a speed of 20GB/s, while the other two trundled along at a leisurely 10GB/s.

Total data transfer between 7am on the Friday and 11pm on the Sunday for the LAN was around 315TB, which may sound like a lot until we compare this to last year’s data transfer of 540TB over the rAge weekend.

This dramatic drop in data is through no fault of the network, which was as fast and stable as ever. Perhaps this is a result of the emergence of affordable uncapped ADSL broadband offerings in SA during 2012, allowing users to get the data they require without having to wait until large LAN event – or maybe gamers just felt like gaming on the network rather than copying files across it.

Impressively, the entire network ran on a DHCP server which auto-assigned IP addresses to each PC at the event. Unfortunately HP didn’t manage this aspect of the network so weren’t able to provide more details on this.

Related articles

rAge 2010 data transfer stats
rAge 2011 event overview
rAge 2011 according to the exhibitors
Interview: Michael James – NAG editor, rAge project manager