Case Study: Colgate University achieves faster issue resolution and real-time application visibility with Riverbed AppResponse Xpert

Colgate University - Customer Case Study

Colgate University is a nationally recognized liberal arts college of about 2,750 undergraduates whose campus depends on a large Cisco-based network to support teaching, research, and student life. IT staff faced the dual challenge of troubleshooting frequent “the network is slow” complaints and policing security and acceptable-use issues in an open academic environment, while traditional tools lacked the machine-by-machine application insight needed to pinpoint causes.

To solve this, Colgate installed a Riverbed AppResponse Xpert appliance in the data center, giving staff real-time and historical visibility into who was generating traffic, which ports and applications were used, and the business impact of performance issues. The appliance enabled faster root-cause diagnosis (one major problem was resolved in under an hour), quicker detection of malware and abusive behavior, better capacity planning, and freed up the network team to focus on strategic projects.

Colgate University

Michael Evans

Senior Network and Systems Analyst