<p>I'm going to be living in one of the Units. I know that each room has ethernet and you need a cable but does the ethernet have enough outlets for three people or will I need an ethernet port? </p>
<p>Also, where in a triple would one put a TV and refrigerator??</p>
<p>The ethernet has enough outlets for three people… Rooms turned into triples were retrofitted by housing and given little box port things so that there are enough.</p>
<p>People generally put their fridge against the wall, between the closet and one of the beds. Not many people bring TVs, but one guy I knew had one in a triple. He put his TV on his desk.</p>
<p>I was in a triple that was not “outfitted” for three people. We had to have a rescomp person come and install a special port a day or so after the internet hook up day.</p>
<p>Unless your tv is really small or you and your roommates are all hyper-efficient when it comes to organization, you probably won’t have room for a television. I know it might seem like there’s room on the day you move in, but if you plan to use your desk for working and/or storage then it will be a tight fit</p>
<p>The triples in some of the buildings in Unit 1 have only 2 ethernet ports. </p>
<p>Rescomp is supposed to provide you with a router (no wireless, only has more ethernet ports) on move-in day. The router is a piece of **** that only supports connection speeds up to about 1mb (megabyte not bit) whereas if you plug your ethernet cable directly into the wall socket, you can get around 10mb. Since you’re in a triple, only 1 person will be able to connect directly to the socket, while the other 2 will have to go through the router. </p>
<p>In my 2nd year in the dorms, rescomp claimed to have run out of routers on move-in day. The rescomp people said that they would have more within a week and that they would bring it to us directly. They never did. One of my roommates had a wireless router so we used that instead.</p>
<p>ETHERNET: I’d go with what copperback sort-of suggested and bring your own wi-fi router (or talk with your roomies and just have one of them bring one), especially if the port does cut down on speed. The convenience of not having to bother stringing more ethernet cables around is good enough reason, haha.</p>
<p>TV: If you snag the desk under the lofted bed, you can easily stick a medium-sized flat-screen (or really small conventional TV) in the back by the wall and still have enough space to work. Or, you could take the desk generally placed against the windows and figure out some way to prop your TV up on the heater ledge behind it or up on the rear desk extension (if your desk has it). Had a friend with a 46’’ somehow get his TV behind the desk so that it was at a good level to use as his laptop MONITOR. Pretty epic stuff. (This was in a double, though, so… obligatory grain of salt.)</p>
<p>REFRIGERATOR: Between a bunk/loft and closet or right in front of the door (in a corner triple–sounds more awkward than it actually is).</p>
<p>As with all big-ticket items, check in with your roommates if you know them or when you find out who they are in August!</p>
<p>So I know one of my roommates and neither of us are tech savvy so we will probably just stay with the ethernet cables. Can you explain how we hook up 3 people if there are only one or two plugs?</p>
<p>When I was in a triple in Unit 1 for 2 years (different buildings), there were only 2 ethernet ports (i.e. 2 plugs in the wall for your ethernet cable to connect to). What rescomp (Residential Computing) does, is they are supposed to provide you with a router that you can then connect to one of the wall ports. The router is a box that has multiple ethernet ports on it. You connect the router to one of the wall ports, and multiple people can then plug their ethernet cables into the router. The router provided by rescomp does not have wi-fi (i.e. it does not support wireless internet, you have to plug ethernet cables into it in order to get internet access).</p>
<p>If you bring your own wireless router that supports wi-fi (pretty much all commercially available ones are wireless, only rescomp is too cheap to provide wireless routers even though they charge us such astronomical fees for housing), you can then connect to the internet via wi-fi. Like fyibtw says, having wi-fi in your room means you won’t need to have ethernet cables all over the place. </p>
<p>In short, if rescomp does their job, you just need to bring your own ethernet cable. If you want wi-fi in your room, bring a wireless router along.</p>
<p>does unit 3 triples have 3 ports?</p>
<p>Every resident will have their own ethernet connection, if that’s what you’re worried about. Because Units 1 and 2 were renovated AFTER Unit 3 and have ported (as opposed to direct, as in double rooms) ethernet connections in corner triples (legit triples–not double rooms converted into triples), I think it’s safe to assume that Unit 3 triples also feature the ResComp-split ethernet connections (with one direct, two split/slow connections).</p>
<p>For those of you who have stayed at the dorms before; would you recommend bringing a TV? I just got a booklet in the mail from Cal saying they have cable connection but that they don’t provide a TV set. For those of you who had a TV, did you use it? What did you use it to watch?</p>
<p>@fyibtw
so you’re saying unit 1 and 2 do not have 3 direct ports?</p>
<p>I don’t really recommend a TV, but then again I don’t watch TV much. People who had TVs used them… At one point we had two rooms with TVs on my floor. One was in a triple, but then its owner left school so, no more TV in that room. It fit okay in that triple though. It was a flatscreen, put at the back of the big double desk under the loft bed.</p>
<p>The other TV came halfway through the year after my friend’s roommate left the dorms for a co-op. Of course, the TV fit beautifully in there because the roommate was never replaced, and my friend effectively had a single room with two beds and desks.</p>
<p>Honestly, Hulu and Netflix are good for most of your TV needs, though without a TV you do miss random things like the news, or random shows that you catch occasionally that you wouldn’t think to watch on the internet. But it was really nice to have someone with a TV on the floor for things like the Super Bowl, and news coverage when Osama bin Laden died. LOL.</p>
<p>@berkicome: No, the Unit 1/2 high-rise triples do not have 3 direct ethernet connections. One is direct, and two are ported/split from the other direct connection. (Each room comes with 2 direct connections.) The Unit 1/2 mini-suites and apartments (Christian, Slottman, Towle, and Wada) were completed in 2005, so those triples might actually have three direct ethernet connections instead of 1 direct/2 ported. Not sure, though.</p>
<p>@LemonCat: Re: TVs… I would recommend bringing one only if your family just has one sitting around–definitely not something to go out and purchase. However, since it sounds like you’ll be living in Foothill, I’d actually recommend bringing the TV if you can. Because Foothill is suite-style, it’s actually REALLY NICE to have a TV for the common area shared by the suite. It definitely helps build community and makes for something to do when you’re too lazy to walk up/down stairs/hills (hahaha). Just make sure that it’s not TOO awesome of a TV (here, big, boxy, old-school TVs are actually best, haha) and that you have some kind of chain/lock available to secure it. (I’d also keep the remote…)</p>
<p>Would you guys recommend taking the bunk bed with the desk underneath or the bunk bed with the bed underneath when it comes to triples?</p>
<p>The lofted bed (desk underneath) was the one I chose when I was in the dorms and I liked it. I toss and turn a lot before I sleep, so I liked that my bed wasn’t connected to anyone else’s sleeping space because I feel like I would’ve disturbed them. I felt like I had more space in the room because it’s obviously the only bed on that side of the room, lol. Plus when I got into bed I didn’t feel like I was disturbing anyone cause my bed was just above the desk.</p>
<p>The bottom bunk is good too, though. You don’t have to climb the side of the bed or a ladder to get into it, which is nice. But if people come into your room as guests of either you or your roomies, they might sit on your bed because space is limited in those rooms. </p>
<p>The bed above the bottom bunk is probably the worst one.</p>
<p>And most importantly, if you can, talk to your roomies about bed and desk choices before move-in! That eliminates the need for some silly race to grab the best resources, and it’s more fair that way.</p>
<p>When do we know who our roommates are?</p>
<p>There’s usually enough space to squeeze in a mini-fridge and microwave around the closets, doesn’t seem too problematic unless your roommates bring a lot of stuff. As for ethernet, our dormroom in Unit3 only had two ports, but one of our roommates only used wifi so it seemed okay. But a wireless router might be helpful. I’d recommend the bottom-bunk, since it’s easy to get out of bed and work in bed etc, or the bed above the desk.</p>
<p>Someone told me that we should know our roommates’ names sometime this month. Hopefully before move-in day.</p>
<p>I plan on taking a 2.7 cu ft fridge. Is that a good size or is it too big? Also what else do I have to bring with me for my dorm?</p>