The lifeblood of Hagerstown, Maryland companies doing organization in the current environment relies on reliable access to The Internet. All companies, big and small, need fast and reliable access to The web.
We’ll, in the months and years ahead, become more and more reliant on our Internet access.
From email messaging to information sharing, e-commerce to archiving data, and voice over IP to video conferencing, the net is omnipresent. What do you need? Maybe a cable modem is a sufficient solution. Metro Ethernet may be what you need. Is Gigabit Internet right for you? Your Hagerstown, Maryland organization probably needs a 5 Meg Internet circuit, 10 Meg Internet access, a 50 Meg circuit, or a 100 Meg Internet access point but which one is best?
Your organization must assess its real needs. This must be done before an appropriate service can be chosen. Is Internet use limited to website surfing or emailing only? Is connecting with cloud servers and sharing real time data the main use of the internet? Are you hosting the data in Hagerstown and distant places or offices rely on you?
What happens to your company if your high-speed Internet experiences an outage? How much downtime can your company withstand? Does your organization require uptime? These types of questions must be answered before you make purchase anything.
In all-encompassing terms, businesses need high-speed Internet access. Choosing the correct broadband for your business requires a cost benefit analysis. Many providers toss out terms such as:
… the real issue is understanding what capability and technical solutions best meet your needs.
For many, if not all, companies in Hagerstown, Maryland, Internet access is needed for at least some employees. The net is required for so many things, whether to order items, look up organization information talk to third parties.
The number of workers you employ, may be the most important factor in your decision making process. If you only have a few workers, you may be fine with a smaller Internet circuit such as a 5 or 10 megabyte. If you have a larger workforce, you may want to consider more. This is especially true if they all need to use the net simultaneously.
High-speed Internet may become less important if the majority of your employees primarily use an intranet system with limited graphics and video. On the other hand, Internet speed becomes dramatically more important when they are required to regularly download things like documents or videos.
Do you routinely backup? Simultaneous connections to the web, which you need in order to sync your backup data, require support. If you conduct remote backups from every workstation, which you definitely should, this will be important.
Does your organization use a file sharing service? DropBox? Google drive? As people save files, those files are pushed to the cloud and then synchronized back to other people’s computers. Running all your services properly, including sharing files, requires that you have the right amount of bandwidth.
Are you interested in high-speed organization Internet? Depending on where you are located, you may want to look into the viability of gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet. These are typically found in “lit buildings” in Hagerstown, Maryland. Providers have already wired these buildings. Adding this high-speed Internet to your office may be surprisingly affordable and easy.
Introducing Metro Ethernet to a new building can be expensive. Bringing a connection to a suite within the building is not. 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.
Consider whether your organization hosts its own servers that run APIs, websites and/or data to outside buildings, offices or companies. Are your company headquarters with a hosted application accessed by 50 branch offices? Is your business retail? Do you have thousands of stores? Do you host the point of sale system for the entire chain? Are you a legal practice hosting the data for three sites?
If you host programs, data or information centrally, people outside of the central location need to have access. People can’t work if you have no 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.
A cost friendly 10 Meg circuit or even a cable modem may satisfy the needs of a company with a single office that needs to surf the web. It is advisable that high-speed access to The net be available at the central organization office or headquarters, including gigabit Ethernet, Metro Ethernet or some other high-speed dedicated circuits. All offer quick speed but they must also be able to support diverse and multiple connections. This could probably not be accomplished with a cable modem.
Utilizing a cable modem or other less expensive circuit may seem like a good option but can result in unexpected cost. Your low monthly bill may mean that the bandwidth is shared among multiple tenants. While you may subscribe to a cable modem with a 30 Meg connection, you may be unable to reach those speeds during 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 amount of bandwidth must be shared with different buildings and with the tenants housed within. 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?
You can find a carrier who can provide dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth. If you want your very own bandwidth that is not used by anyone else, you should consider this. The full capacity of your circuit should be attainable during all hours regardless of neighboring buildings, people or offices.
Five Meg, ten Meg, fifty Meg and 100 Meg circuits of guaranteed bandwidth are available with Metro Ethernet. With gigabit Internet providers, you can reach gigabit speeds in your office out to the web.
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 Hagerstown even though some providers offer superior Internet bandwidth products. How can you decrease the chance of an outage?
Try using redundant circuits.
There are, in essence, two types of redundancy.
The first type exists when the same carrier gives you multiple circuits. When there are problems with a physical line or a port or other failures, it can be helpful to have redundant circuits. Even multiple circuits can fail, such as in the event of a large-scale carrier outage or when there damage to an external line. This offers some protection and assurance but does not eliminate all threats.
In the second type of redundancy, you bring in circuits from two different providers. By using IP address allocations and certain routers, you can bind your connections. By doing this, it appears and behaves as a single circuit. Though they may appear as one, you know that they are each individual circuits and redundant to each other. While circuit redundancy in general is a good idea, diversity redundancy by using different carriers, offers far better protection. In the event that one carrier goes down, the other will still be alive.
When considering redundant circuits and providers, try to be sure that the carriers you look at in Hagerstown have different physical geographic routes or pathways. Doing so will maximize redundancy. Your goal should be to get circuits coming into your building on different sides. You do not want them on the same side. 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 sites. What if there is some kind of catastrophic incident such as a fire or accident that impacts circuits within a region? Now, you have redundancy in an alternative physical direction.
It is true that access to The Internet costs you money. However, the cost does not come close to what you will pay if the access that is not reliable. Consider these scenarios:
Is your organization on a cable modem? How many other tenants is your carrier servicing in your building? Are 14 other offices getting circuits? Between 9 and 5, any of those other offices could be downloading huge files, streaming video or taking large volume of phone calls and more. As they use more bandwidth, there is less for available for your needs. What happens to your phone calls? How will the caliber of the call be affected? Maybe calls will randomly drop? Will the calls be choppy?
Your office is the center of your organization. You may be a law firm that does file sharing or a retailer operating a POS system. All of your sites, you may have 2, you may have 500, you may have 4, 000, count on your main Internet connection to access and receive data. What happens if your circuit crashes? Would it annoy you or destroy you? Are your other offices able to do any work? Process new orders? Share essential data? Choosing the right solution depends largely on assessing and understanding the specific needs of your business. What if you are a software company? Perhaps you are running a hosted solution and it must be used by multiple customers; maybe even hundreds. Is an API utilized in your company so that your customers can access and speak with your system? What happens when they are unable to connect to your servers? Customers will only take so many repeated outages. How long with they remain with your company?
Your organization is entirely Internet based. If your circuits go down, you cannot make calls. They are also unable to answer calls. You are now, essentially, out of company. While many of the most reputable call centers are already aware and using the advantages of redundancy, is it sufficiently meeting their needs? Are your current carriers as dependable as you would like? Do you consistently get quality service that provides clear and reliable calls?
Clearly, there are many choices. Your choices will largely rely on your budget, in addition to the other requirements of your business. To recap:
If you are a small organization, with just one location and not concerned about redundancy, a single five meg, 10 meg or 50 meg access to The net circuit may be adequate. Find out if you are in a lit building. If so, the price of Metro Ethernet or gigabit service may be affordable. Prices change based on your location and the availability of circuits. Please speak with our engineers about what options best suit your needs.
You have a midsized company in Hagerstown, Maryland; you will surely need higher-speed Internet. You have several choices. Consider the following: Gigabit Internet, Metro Ethernet or higher-speed access to The net circuits. Multiple circuits utilizing multiple providers would, ideally, provide you with maximum redundancy. You can sometimes achieve this without doubling costs. For example, you may use 2 fifty meg circuits instead of 1 one hundred meg circuit. Again, costs vary. Availability also varies. You should speak with our experts to learn the options for your particular location.
Companies with multiple sites are most at risk for failure. Redundancy is crucial. Multiple providers are highly desirable. You can increase redundancy with switches or routers. Having redundant equipment can also minimize risk. Take a careful look at Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers and gigabit Internet providers. Research other high-speed Internet access circuit providers also and make an informed decision. The right combination of services and providers can positively impact the efficiency of your business.
Companies such as these require the following: Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and point-to-point (PPP) high-speed Internet circuits. Having redundant hardware as well as redundant circuits from different providers will ensure your needed uptime. You need enough bandwidth. The bandwidth must be adequate to handle spikes in usage with no slowdowns or interruptions. Having both your hardware and your circuits capable of supporting many different, fast, and simultaneous connections is essential. It cannot be one or the other.
Do not risk having failing circuits or not enough bandwidth. Your demand and budget constraints should both be considered when you decide what circuit or combination of circuits you must have. Choosing the right combination of hardware and circuits can be complicated and confusing.
Our expert engineers will review your requirements and needs and create a free action plan for you. We are going to examine your current usage and demand levels then create a design that provides you with the resources you need to keep your company running smoothly at a reasonable cost.
An appointment for an assessment can be made by calling our office or clicking here to complete the contact form on the side of this page. We can often provide assessments within 48 hours.