PUPILS at Stonyhurst College are to receive high-speed internet access, thanks to the boom in broadband.

In the rooms where Sherlock Holmes creator Conan Doyle and his contemporaries carved their names on desktops, pupils will soon be plugging in their laptops.

From September, they will have free, filtered access to the internet from across the college, including their bedrooms.

More than 300 computers are already installed in the college, but an increasing number of pupils now have their own laptops and thanks to broadband more of them look set to log on.

A dish will be concealed on the roof of the Grade One listed college building during the summer and high speed internet access received from a radio transmission station at Wiswell.

Stonyhurst College head of IT Mike Gibson said: "This is part of the Cumbria and Lancashire Education On-line Broadband Project, which will increase internet speed dramatically.

"As far as I am aware, we are well ahead of our competitors with the amount of networking access around the building."

The first pupils to benefit from internet access will be boys aged 12 and 13, who will have a network point at their desks in their new study centre and dormitory, while sixth form boys and girls will have free access to a live networking point in their study bedrooms from September.