University of Hawaii Information Technology Center

CHALLENGE

The University of Hawaii’s Information Technology Center is a new 24/7/365 state-of-the-art facility that maximizes sustainability and expands UH IT Services’ capabilities to manage, facilitate, and provide support of IT resources and systems throughout the State of Hawaii, all from a centralized location. ITS’ directive is to provide IT support to the University’s 10 campus system and multiple education, research, and training centers spread across six islands. UH ITS has a unique and difficult challenge because of Hawaii’s geographical limitations that include high mountains and deep ocean channels between islands. The under-resourced IT unit was spread across seven buildings and housed in facilities with aged infrastructure that was insufficient to support the amount of ther mal and electrical requirements IT servers needed.

SOLUTION

The new facility allowed for consolidation of ITS staff to provide a centralized help desk, operations and management center, maintenance services statewide as well as provide a multimedia facility that the University community could benefit from and utilize on a daily basis. AMX’s new Enova series digital media multi-format switchers and DX link transmitters were exactly the answers UH ITS was looking for. Not only do these products solve many of the most pressing challenges but they have also paved a scalable path into the digital future. With an intuitive user interface, users enter a room and operate all of the multimedia technologies from a centralized wireless enabled touch panel. TP Control allows ITS to provide a new level of support through remote management, monitoring, and troubleshooting equipment reducing travel costs to the many different campuses and centers across the island-state. Resource Management Suite allows UH ITS to schedule and automate all video walls, monitors, projectors and associated equipment to power on and off, ensuring that we maintain an efficient balance between productivity and energy savings.

IMPACT

"The Flagship Manoa campus, home to ITS, now provides multimedia videoconferencing facilities that are readily available to staff, students and departments so that collaboration among neighbor island campuses and institutions are easily facilitated. All of these issues had to be overcome without the hiring of new employees."

– University of Hawaii Representative