The lifeblood of Fond du Lac, Wisconsin companies doing business in the current environment depends on reliable access to The web. All companies, big and small, need fast and reliable access to The web.
In the months and years ahead, people and businesses will become more reliant on access to the web.
The use of the net is pervasive. We use it for email and data sharing, video chat and VOIP, archiving and commerce. What is the right solution for your needs? A cable modem may be satisfactory. It could be that you need Metro Ethernet. You may need Gigabit Internet. Does your organization in Fond du Lac need one of these: 10 Meg access to The Internet, a 100 Meg Internet access point, a 50 meg circuit or a 5 meg circuit?
Prior to selecting a service, your company must figure out its needs. Will web surfing and email be your primary use of the web? Is the web used for real-time data connection with servers in the cloud? You may be hosting the data in Fond du Lac and remote places rely on this.
How would an outage to your high-speed Internet affect your organization? How might the downtime cause problems for your organization? Does your business require uptime? These types of questions must be answered before you make purchase anything.
High-speed access to the net is something all companies need. Before you choose your broadband internet, look at the costs and benefits. Performing this analysis is an important step in picking the right one for your organization. While many providers like to spout technical terminologies such as:
… the real issue is understanding what capability and technical solutions best meet your needs.
Companies in Fond du Lac need access to the internet for their employees. Some companies may need it only for a few people and others may need it for the entire workforce. Whether it is for company research, to order supplies or to use third-party applications, the internet is required.
The number of workers you have may be the factor that drives your decision. A smaller Internet circuit may be enough if you only have a handful of workers. Perhaps a 5 or 10 megabyte is all you need. You may need more if you have more workers and those workers all need to be on the internet during the same hours.
High-speed Internet may become less important if the majority of your employees primarily use an intranet system with limited graphics and video. However, employees who must often download documents, images and videos, need that speed.
Do you backup information? It is recommended that you do remote backups from every desk. If you are, you will need to support simultaneous connections out to the web to synchronize the backup data to collect.
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. The right amount of capacity or bandwidth is necessary to support this function in conjunction with every other service you have.
You may consider high-speed business access to The net if you location warrants it. Gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet may be viable options for you. They are usually contained in “lit buildings” in Fond du Lac that have already been wired by a carrier. It may be shock you to know that installing high-speed access to The net may not be particularly expensive or inconvenient.
The introduction of Metro Ethernet into a new building can be quite costly. However, bringing that connection into office space within that building is usually less so. You can actually get high-speed access with gigabit Internet or even Metro Ethernet quickly. It often takes only 30 days or less, depending on availability.
Do you have your own organization servers that run APIs, websites or feeds for offsite offices or companies? Are your company headquarters with a hosted application accessed by 50 branch offices? Are you a retail business with 10, 000 stores? Do you host the POS system for all of them? Does your legal practice host all of the data for 3, 4 or 5 offices in different sites?
When data, programs, or information is hosted centrally, those outside your office must gain access. Those people are not able to do their work if the internet connection fails or is unreliable. If you need multiple connections to function at the same time from many different sites, make sure that your intranet solution can reliably support it.
For a single office surfing the web, a cable modem or inexpensive 10 Meg circuit may be adequate. High-speed dedicated circuits, Metro Ethernet or gigabit Ethernet are advisable for company headquarters. While high speed is great, you also need support for your multiple 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. You may save money on your monthly bill but the bandwidth you get must be shared among many people. While you may subscribe to a cable modem with a 30 Meg connection, you may be unable to reach those speeds during peak hours. Cable operators are only permitted to establish a certain amount of bandwidth within communities. The bandwidth branches off to the multiple buildings, offices and tenants within them. During crucial working hours, you may not get to the 30-meg speed you have been capped at. What will the consequences be if you expect 30 but only get half that? What if you get even less?
You can sign up for dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth from some providers. If you want your very own bandwidth that is not used by anyone else, you should consider this. Regardless of neighbors, or other tenants, you should have the full capacity of your circuit at all times.
For example, Metro Ethernet guarantees bandwidth in 5 met circuits, 10 Meg circuits, 50 and 100 Meg circuits. You can reach gigabit speeds with gigabit Internet providers.
In these cases, the providers deliver high-speed to the building in sufficient quantity that they can then split their circuit to various tenants while guaranteeing each tenant is receiving their contracted speeds.
Despite outstanding Internet bandwidth products offered by providers in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, circuits do go down. In what way can you diminish the risk of an outage?
Try using redundant circuits.
There are, in essence, two types of redundancy.
The first kind of redundancy exists when one carrier provides one customer with many circuits. Redundant circuits help protect you from certain failures including physical line issues, port issues within routers, and others. It is possible for both circuits to go down. If your carrier has a regional problem like a widespread outage, or there is a broken line outside your building, even your redundant circuits may fail. While there is some protection, there is also some risk.
In the second type of redundancy, you bring in circuits from two different carriers. You may want your circuits to appear and act as if they are one and come from the same source. If so you can use IP address allocations and advanced routers to do so. You know the truth: that they are individual circuits and are there to back each other up in case one goes down. Diversity redundancy offers far greater protection. When one carrier has a problem like an outage or some other failure, you have another one that works.
To maximize the benefit of redundancy, consider looking for redundant circuits from different providers that have different pathway in Fond du Lac. Basically this means that you want your circuits to enter your building on different sides or paths. Whether they are attached underground or to a telephone pole, your goal should be to have the circuits in different directions leading to different central locations. If you can accomplish this, you are protected from a major catastrophe. For example, if a there is a fire or some other accident that negatively affects circuits in a region, you have redundancy in a physically different direction.
Even though Internet access comes with a cost, you will save money if you make sure it is dependable. Unreliable access will end up costing you more in the long run. Contemplate these scenarios:
Your office uses a cable modem and, in addition to you, the carrier provides 10-15 additional tenants with 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. As available bandwidth shrinks, what will happen to your calls? What about the quality of your calls? Will calls be cut-off? Will you sound muffled?
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. All of your offices, whether you have 3 or 3, 000, rely on your primary Internet connection to successfully access data. What happens if your circuit goes down? Is it simply an irritation or a catastrophe? Are your other offices able to do any work? Take new orders? Service existing ones? Circulate essential files and data? Do you know what your business needs? Be sure to fully understand your requirements. It will help you choose the correct solution. Maybe you are a corporation that designs and sells software and you run a hosted solution that is used by hundreds and hundreds of customers. You may operate a service like this: other systems speak with yours via an API to figure out freight prices, stock prices, to compile weather data or receive any other information that you provide. What happens when they are unable to connect to your servers? Customers do not enjoy repeated outages. How long with they put up with them before looking to take their company elsewhere?
Your business is completely dependent on the web. Should your circuits go down, your representatives cannot make outbound calls. Your reps have no way of answering calls, if they even know they are coming in. Basically, you are out of business. For competent call centers that already use and understand the problems that can arise, is redundancy enough? Are you really getting the dependable service you need form your carriers? Are you using providers that are truly reliable? You should be getting high quality service that ensures your calls are consistently clear and reliable.
Clearly, there are many choices. The needs and budget of your company will both affect your choices. Essentially:
If you are a small company, with one location and you do not worry about redundancy, one five meg, ten meg, or fifty meg Internet access circuit may very well be enough to meet your needs. If you are in a “lit” building, Metro Ethernet or gigabit service may be reasonably priced options. Because prices can vary based on the location of your business and the availability of circuits, speak with our engineers to learn your options.
If you have a midsized business in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, you will need higher-speed Internet access. Your choices include: Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet or other high-speed circuits. Ideally, multiple circuits from multiple providers will provide you with the greatest redundancy. You can sometimes achieve this without doubling costs. Two 50-megabyte circuits may be more cost effective than a single 100 circuit. Availability and costs vary. Learn your options by speaking with one of our knowledgeable experts. We can help you determine what is available in your specific location.
Any company with more than one location suffers the greatest risk of problems. Redundant circuits are a necessity. Multiple providers are highly desirable. Redundant routers, switches and other equipment can also be helpful to lessen downtime during a problem. As always, take a careful look and choose the right Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers, gigabit Internet providers and other high-speed access to The Internet circuit providers. The right mix of providers and services will help keep your business up and running as efficiently as possible.
If you fall into this group, you must have Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet circuits and point-to-point High-speed Internet circuits. Redundant hardware and redundant circuits will, for these businesses, ensure the greatest uptime. Be sure the circuits are from different providers. You do not want any slowdowns or interruptions that often occur during spikes in usage. Avoid this by having sufficient bandwidth. Your circuits and hardware must be able to support a large number of fast and simultaneous connections.
The danger and risk of failing circuits is tremendous. So is the risk of having less bandwidth than you need. It is imperative that the circuit or circuits you choose meet your needs but also keep you within your allowable budget. The pressure involved in selecting the proper mix of hardware and circuits can be overwhelming.
Our engineers will take the pressure off and develop a free action plan for you by analyzing your needs. We’ll examine your demand levels and current usage. We are going to then design a plan that keeps your costs reasonable while meeting your demand for a smoothly run organization.
If you would like to arrange for an assessment, please click here to complete the contact information form to the right. You can call our office as well. Assessments are completed in as little as 48 hours.