In today’s world, Haltom City companies need dependable access to The Internet. It is the lifeblood of their business. The organization functions of every company, whether it is a small business or on the Fortune 500, from Fortune 500, relies on fast and reliable access to The Internet.
Our reliance on access to the net will become greater in the near and distant future.
The use of the internet is pervasive. We use it for email and data sharing, video conferencing and VOIP, archiving and commerce. What do you need? Is a cable modem enough? Your needs may point to Metro Ethernet as a solution. Is Gigabit Internet right for you? Does your business in Haltom City, Texas need one of these: 10 Meg Internet access, a 100 Meg Internet access point, a 50 meg circuit or a 5 meg circuit?
Before choosing an adequate or appropriate service, you must decide what your organization really needs. Perhaps the internet is only used for a few things such as email communication or surfing the web. Will Internet usage mainly involve cloud servers and real time data connection? Do remote locations depend on you hosting the data in Haltom City, Texas?
What happens if you have an outage in your high-speed Internet? How will the downtime affect your business? Is the absence of uptime detrimental? Before buying, these are several of the questions that you must answer.
In the broadest of terms, companies need high-speed Internet access. When picking the correct broadband internet, balancing the costs and benefits to your company is imperative. You will hear service providers use terms like:
… you must not lose sight of the real issue, which is understanding what technical solutions best meet your needs.
At most businesses including those in Haltom City, Texas, some or all employees need access to The web. Whether it is to speak with shippers, do research or place orders, access to The web is required.
The number of employees you have may determine your best solution. If you have a handful of employees, a 5 or 10 Meg Internet circuit may be adequate. If you have 50 employees who are using the net simultaneously, you may need more.
Your workforce may simply use an intranet system with limited video and graphics. If this is true, your need for high speed Internet be less than you thought. On the other hand, Internet speed becomes dramatically more important when they are required to regularly download things like documents or videos.
Do you perform backups at your company? You may need to support simultaneous connections to the web in order to sync your backup data. If you conduct remote backups from every workstation, which is advisable, this will be important.
Does your organization use a file sharing service? DropBox? Google drive? 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. You need to have sufficient bandwidth to support this function while also supporting every other service.
You may consider high-speed company access to The net if you location warrants it. Gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet may be viable options for you. These are typically found in “lit buildings” in Haltom City, Texas. Providers have already wired these buildings. It may be shock you to know that installing high-speed access to The net may not be particularly expensive or inconvenient.
Introducing Metro Ethernet to a new building can be expensive. Bringing a connection to a suite within the building is not. Did you know that obtaining high-speed access to The web with Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet can often take 30 days or less? Of course, this depends upon availability.
Ask yourself this: Does we host our own servers to run APIs, websites and data feeds to external offices or business premises? Is your main business office with a hosted application accessed by 40 or even 50 branch office sites? Perhaps you are in retail and host the point of sale (POS) system for thousands of stores? Are you a law firm? Do you host data for three or more external sites?
When things are hosted at a central point, parties outside the office must somehow gain access. Those people are not able to do their work if the internet connection fails or is unreliable. Are you picking an intranet solution that provides reliability and stability for your multiple, simultaneous connections from various sites?
For one office or a small organization with just one or two people surfing the web, a less expensive 10 Meg circuit or a cable modem may meet your needs. High-speed Internet access is advisable for the headquarters. Gigabit Ethernet, Metro Ethernet or some other high-speed dedicated circuit is recommended. All offer quick speed but they must also be able to support diverse and multiple connections. The support you need could not be provided by a cable modem.
Bringing in a less-expensive circuit like a cable modem often comes with a price. You may have to share bandwidth in order to secure that low monthly rate. During peak hours, your connection may slow down, even though you subscribe to a cable modem with a thirty-megabyte connection. Often, within a given community, cable companies may only deliver a particular amount of bandwidth. Different buildings and tenants housed or working within those buildings all share that set amount of bandwidth. The 30-meg speed you are capped out sounds good but it is possible that you will never reach that speed during business hours. If you expect 30 but only get 6, will you have problems?
You can sign up for dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth from some carriers. In this situation, you do not have to share bandwidth. The bandwidth is all yours and is fully allocated to the needs of your business. Regardless of neighbors, or other tenants, you should have the full capacity of your circuit at all times.
With Metro Ethernet, for example, you can receive a guaranteed bandwidth in various increments including 5 and 10 Meg circuits, and 50 and 100 Meg circuits. Gigabit speeds from your office to the web can be reached if you use a gigabit Internet provider.
Here, providers deliver enough high-speed to the building, so that it can be split among various tenants. The carrier has the right amount so that everyone gets the contracted speed that has been promised.
The truth is that circuits can go down in Haltom City, Texas even though some providers offer superior Internet bandwidth products. The question then becomes, “how do I minimize my chance of an outage? ”
Redundant circuits.
There are, in reality, two kinds of redundancy.
The first kind of redundancy exists when one carrier provides one customer with many circuits. If there is a problem with a line or a port in your router, circuit redundancy can offer some protection. However, if that carrier has a greater outage to your entire region or there is a line damaged outside of your office building, you may have both or all circuits go down. While offering some protection, it is not without risk.
The second way to set up circuit redundancy is by using two different carriers to bring in your circuits. 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. Though they may appear as one, you know that they are each individual circuits and redundant to each other. Diversity redundancy, as this is called, offers you more protection that you might realize. 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 Haltom City. Your goal should be to get circuits coming into your building on different sides. You do not want them on the same side. The circuits would be established either underground or on telephone poles and would be set up in different directions and lead to different offices. If a major accident occurs or there is a fire that impedes the function of circuits in a particular region, you have redundancy in a different direction.
While Internet access is not free, it pales in comparison with the cost of not having reliable Internet access. Contemplate these scenarios:
The carrier you use for your cable modem also provides circuits for a dozen or more tenants in the office building. During your working day, those tenants could be conducting massive downloads of information, processing a large amount of calls or streaming endless video. As they use more bandwidth, there is less for available for your requirements. What will happen to your phone calls? How will the quality of that phone call be affected? Will you lose calls? Will they be full of static?
Regardless of whether you are part of a legal practice and your firm does file sharing, or an accounting practice sharing databases, your office is the central point or hub of your business. Your primary Internet connection is responsible for granting access to data to all of your sites. This is true whether you have 3 sites or 2000 locations. What happens if your circuit goes down? Would it annoy you or destroy you? Can your satellite or remote office do any work at all? Process new orders? Circulate necessary data? Do you know what your organization needs? Be sure to fully understand your requirements. It will help you choose the correct solution. Perhaps you are a software company, running a hosted solution used by hundreds of customers. Is an API utilized in your company so that your customers can access and talk to your system? What if these other systems have difficulty connecting your servers? Multiple outages may annoy your customers.
Your organization is completely dependent on the internet. What if your representatives can make no outgoing telephone calls because your circuits go down? They are also unable to answer calls. Your organization is basically done with. Is redundancy enough? Many of the finest call centers with the best reputations already understand and use redundancy. They should consider if they have sufficient protection. Can you truly rely on your carriers? Are they as dependable as they claim? Are you getting quality service so that your calls are clear and consistent?
It should be clear by now that you have many different options to select from. Your organization needs and your budget will have to come into consideration when deciding on your solutions. Essentially:
Sometimes redundancy is not vital to you. For example, If you are a small organization, with just one office location, a single Internet access circuit may be adequate. You may get by with one 50, 10 or even 5 megabyte circuit. If you are in a “lit” building, Metro Ethernet or gigabit service may be reasonably priced options. The availability of circuits and your location determine prices; speak with one of our engineers to learn what your best options are.
Mid sized companies with a single office in Haltom City, need higher speed access to The Internet. Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and other higher-speed Internet circuits are your options. Using different circuits and different carriers will, if you choose, provide you with redundancy. Achieving this may cost extra but it won’t double your 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. Availability and costs vary. Call one of our experts to learn what is available in your specific area.
If your organization has several places or offices, you are at great risk for failure. Redundant circuits must be an essential part of their systems. Multiple providers are highly desirable. Redundant routers, switches and other equipment can also be helpful to lessen downtime during a problem. Have you looked at Metro Ethernet providers, gigabit Internet providers and other high-speed access to The web circuit providers? You should do so before making a decision. Finding the best combination of services, providers and equipment can go a long way toward helping your organization run as efficiently as possible.
To run efficiently and effectively, corporations and businesses that fall into this category must use point-to-point high-speed Internet circuits, gigabit Internet circuits and Metro Ethernet circuits. You will want to have the greatest protection of your uptime. To accomplish this you must have redundancy: redundant circuits from multiple providers and redundant hardware for your system. You do not want any slowdowns or interruptions that often occur during spikes in usage. Avoid this by having sufficient bandwidth. 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.
Do you understand how great the risk of failing circuits and insufficient bandwidth really is? Your demand and budget constraints should both be considered when you decide what circuit or combination of circuits you must have. It is vital to choose the correct mix of hardware and circuits. Figuring out exactly what to put in the mix, can be a daunting task.
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. We’ll examine your demand levels and current usage. We will then design a plan that keeps your costs reasonable while meeting your demand for a smoothly run company.
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