In today’s environment, companies in Fairfield depend on reliable access to The web as the lifeblood of their business. All companies, from Fortune 500 to small businesses, have functions that rely on easy, dependable and quick access to The net.
Internet access will become increasingly vital to us in the coming months and years. Our dependence on access to The web will only grow as time goes on.
The use of the web is pervasive. We use it for email and data sharing, video conferencing and VOIP, archiving and commerce. How can your needs be met? Is a cable modem sufficient? It could be that you need Metro Ethernet. Is Gigabit Internet right for you? What does your Fairfield, California company need? Does it require 10 Meg access to The net, a 100 Meg Internet access point, a 50 Meg circuit or a 5 Meg circuit?
Before selecting the appropriate service, your company must assess its needs. Will web surfing and email be your primary use of the web? Is real time data connection with cloud servers vital to your organization? Are you hosting data in Fairfield? Do remote locations rely on you?
What happens if you have an outage in your high-speed Internet? How much downtime can your company withstand? Is your success dependent on uptime? Before you buy anything, you must answer these questions.
High-speed access to the internet is something all companies need. When choosing the right broadband for organization, you need to analyze and balance the costs and benefits. While you are likely to hear some service providers toss around terms such as:
… focus on what matters: what does your business need and what are the best services and solutions out there to meet those needs?
At most businesses including those in Fairfield, California, some or all employees need Internet access. Third party applications, business research or development and e-commerce are just several of the ways the net may be needed.
The number of workers you have may be the factor that drives your decision. A five or ten megabyte Internet circuit may be all you need if employ a small workforce. If you have 50 employees who are using the net simultaneously, you may need more.
Do your employees primarily use an intranet system? If so, you may not need much high-speed Internet service. On the other hand, if your company requires that its employees download many documents or images and videos, Internet speed becomes more important.
Does your organization regularly conduct backups? If, as recommended, you conduct remote backups from every single desk, you will need to support simultaneous connections out to the web. This will allow you to sync your backup data.
Do you use a file-sharing service? Perhaps you use Google drive, DropBox or a different service? This is how a file sharing service works: You save a file. Then the file is pushed to the cloud, and is then synchronized with other people’s computers. Supporting file sharing, while supporting every other service, requires sufficient bandwidth.
Depending on where you are, you may want to look into high-speed company Internet access such as Metro Ethernet and gigabit Internet. They are usually contained in “lit buildings” in Fairfield that have already been wired by a carrier. Choosing to add high-speed Internet to your office is a tough decision but it can be less expensive and easier than you think.
While it may be the case that bringing Metro Ethernet into a new building can cause a big dent in your wallet, bringing the connection to a suite or offices within that building does not have to. Depending on availability, it is often possible to obtain high-speed Internet access with Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet in 30 days or less.
Ask yourself this: Does we host our own servers to run APIs, websites and data feeds to external offices or organization premises? Do your headquarters have a hosted Internet application that must be accessed regularly by 40 or 50 branch offices? Perhaps you are in retail and host the point of sale (POS) system for thousands of stores? Are you a law firm hosting data for multiple office locations?
When things are hosted at a central point, parties outside the office must somehow gain access. Those people are not able to work without a solid Internet connection. Make sure that when you choose your intranet solution it is reliable enough to support your need for multiple and simultaneous connections for many different places.
If you have one office using the web, you may get by with a cable modem or a low- cost 10-megabyte circuit. High-speed access to The Internet is advisable for the headquarters. Gigabit Ethernet, Metro Ethernet or some other high-speed dedicated circuit is recommended. High-speed alone is not enough. They must also need to be capable of supporting many diverse connections. This could probably not be accomplished with a cable modem.
In many scenarios, bringing in an inexpensive circuit, such as a cable modem, comes at a price. While the monthly rate is lower, the bandwidth is generally shared among other tenants. You may experience slow downs. For example, although you subscribe to a cable modem with a thirty Meg connection, it can be difficult to maintain the maximum speed during busy times and peak hours. Only a certain amount of bandwidth may be available in a community. Many cable companies have limits on the amount they can deliver. That bandwidth branches off to different buildings and then to various tenants within those buildings. Will you achieve 30-meg speed during the working day? Do you care if you only get 6 when you were set up to expect 30?
Some providers are available who offer dedicated bandwidth and guaranteed bandwidth. In this case, your business receives full allocation of bandwidth. There is no sharing with any outsiders. You should receive full capacity of your circuits during all hours. This is true even though you may have many buildings, businesses and tenants nearby.
As an example, look at Metro Ethernet. They provide guaranteed bandwidth in various increments. You can receive guaranteed bandwidth in increments of 100, 50, 10 and 5 megabytes. In your office out to the internet you can reach gigabit speeds with gigabit providers
The providers in this situation deliver high-speed to a particular building in sufficient quantity to split their circuit among various tenants. Of course, they must ensure that they each get the specific amount of their contracted speed.
The truth is that circuits can go down in Fairfield even though some carriers offer superior Internet bandwidth products. You must ask yourself: “how do I lessen the chance of an outage? ”
Try using redundant circuits.
Redundancy basically comes in two forms.
The first type exists when the same carrier gives you multiple circuits. Redundant circuits help protect you from certain failures including physical line issues, port issues within routers, and others. Even multiple circuits can fail, such as in the event of a large-scale carrier outage or when there damage to an external line. While offering some protection, it is not without risk.
Utilizing circuits from two different providers is the second kind of redundancy. By using IP address allocations and certain routers, you can bind your connections. By doing this, it appears and behaves as a single circuit. In fact, they are totally redundant and separate. While circuit redundancy in general is a good idea, diversity redundancy by using different providers, offers far better protection. In the event a carrier goes down, you will not have to worry. You will have a perfectly live carrier there to keep things moving.
If you want to maximize redundancy in Fairfield, California please consider the following question: Do the carriers I am considering use the same physical geographic pathways? Alternatively stated, try to have your circuits enter the building on different sides from one another. The circuits would be attached to telephone poles (or underground conduits) in different directions leading to different data centers or central offices. Having redundancy in different physical directions can protect you if there is a serious incident at a data center or some accident that causes a regional circuit issue.
Internet access costs money but the cost of NOT having reliable access to The Internet is greater. Please consider these situations:
Is your organization on a cable modem? How many other tenants is your carrier servicing in your building? Are 14 other offices getting circuits? During the course of a regular work day, any or all of these other businesses might be performing massive file downloads. Tenants might be taking a large volume of calls or be regularly streaming video. What will happen to your telephone calls as the amount of usable bandwidth decreases? What about phone call quality? Will calls be arbitrarily dropped? Will the calls be choppy?
You may be an accounting firm that shares databases, a retail chain company utilizing a point of sale system or a law practice sharing files. Regardless of the specifics, your office is the hub for your enterprise. Whether you have 2 locations, 250, or 2000, they all rely on your primary Internet connection to retrieve data and information. What happens if your circuit goes down? Is it a mere annoyance or a catastrophic failure? Can your satellite offices perform any work at all? Take new orders? Service existing ones? Share information? Make sure you completely understand your needs before you pick a solution. You have a software company, and are running a hosted solution for dozens, maybe hundreds, of customers. Maybe you operate a service that allows other systems to talk to yours via API. This may be to collect miscellaneous data, calculate prices or shipping rates or other information. What if other systems can’t connect to your office servers? Will your customers remain loyal to you if they have to withstand multiple outages?
Does your business completely rely on the net? Your employees or representatives will not be able to make outgoing phone calls if your circuits go down. Calls coming in would be unanswerable. You might not even know people are trying to reach your office. Basically, you are out of business. For competent call centers that already use and understand the problems that can arise, is redundancy enough? Are the providers you currently use as reliable as they should be? Are they as reliable as you need them to be? You should be getting high quality service that ensures your calls are consistently clear and reliable.
Clearly, there are many choices. Your decision will be based on different factors including your company needs and your budget. To recap:
If your company is small, with one location or office, you are likely not concerned about redundancy. For you, a single 5, 10 or 50 megabyte Internet access circuit may suffice. Metro Ethernet service or gigabit service may also be a reasonably priced option if you are in a lit building. Prices vary based on your location and availability of circuits; speak with our engineers to find your best option.
You have a midsized company in Fairfield, California; you will surely need higher-speed Internet. You have several choices. Consider the following: Gigabit Internet, Metro Ethernet or higher-speed access to The Internet circuits. Using different circuits and different carriers will, if you choose, provide you with redundancy. It is sometimes possible to reach this without adding ridiculous costs. Two smaller circuits may be cheaper than one. For instance, you may use two 50 meg circuits instead of a single 100 meg circuit. Remember, costs vary. So does availability. Learn your options by speaking with one of our knowledgeable experts. We can help you determine what is available in your specific location.
Companies with different locations, whether 5 or 50, are at the highest risk. They need redundant circuits. Multiple providers or carriers are recommended. In addition, consider redundant equipment. Redundant routers and switches can minimize risk also. Here also, examine the Ethernet access services, gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet providers. Take a careful look at other high-speed access to The net circuit providers before choosing the right one. Finding the best combination of services, providers and equipment can go a long way toward helping your business run as efficiently as possible.
For companies falling in this category, gigabit Internet circuits, Metro Ethernet Internet circuits and point-to-point high-speed Internet circuits are essential. Redundant hardware and redundant circuits will, for these businesses, ensure the greatest uptime. Be sure the circuits are from different providers. The last thing you want is interruptions or slowdowns affecting your organization. You must provide enough bandwidth to avoid these pitfalls that sometimes occur during sudden usage spikes. Your goal is to have hardware and circuits that are more than capable of providing support to a significant number of fast and simultaneous connections.
There is great risk of failing circuits or insufficient bandwidth. You need to have the right circuit or circuits to meet your demands while staying within your budget. There is tremendous pressure on you to choose the best combination of circuits and hardware.
We have experts to help. Our engineers will do an analysis of your needs and requirements, and develop a free action plan for you based on their findings. Our experts will examine your current usage and demand. We will then generate a design that gives you the resources you need while keeping your organization up and running at a reasonable cost.
Please complete the contact form by clicking here. You may also call our office to set up an appointment for your assessment. Assessments are completed in as little as 48 hours.