High-Speed Harrisonburg, Virginia Access To The Net

High Speed access to The Internet in Harrisonburg: Company Broadband Internet, Gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet Access

Reliable Internet access is the lifeblood of Harrisonburg, Virginia companies and their company. The business functions of all companies, from Fortune 500 to small companies, depend on fast and reliable Internet access.

Internet access will become increasingly important to us in the coming months and years. Our dependence on access to The Internet will only grow as time goes on.

From email to data sharing, video conferencing to VoIP, and data archiving to Internet commerce, the web is ubiquitous. What is the best solution for you? Maybe a cable modem is a sufficient solution. Do you need Metro Ethernet? Gigabit Internet may be required. What is best for your organization in Harrisonburg, Virginia? Will your organization needs be met with a 50 Meg circuit, a 5 Meg circuit, 10 Meg access to The Internet or 100 Meg access to The Internet point?

Determining your Organization Need for Internet Access

Prior to selecting a service, your business must figure out its needs. Why will you need the internet? Will you only be web surfing and emailing? Will real-time data connection with servers in the cloud be the primary use of the internet? Are you hosting the data in Harrisonburg, Virginia that remote places depend upon?

Have you thought about what will happen to your company if your high-speed Internet is interrupted by an outage? Can your company afford the downtime? Is uptime essential? Prior to making any purchases, you must determine the answers to these questions.

Looking at Different High Speed Internet Solutions: Harrisonburg

High-speed access to the net is something all companies need. You need to analyze and balance the costs and benefits to your company before choosing the right broadband internet. While you are likely to hear some service providers toss around terms such as:

• High-speed access to the Internet
• Business Internet / Internet for business
• Broadband cable modems are our specialty
• Metropolitan-area Ethernet
• Gigabit Internet
• MPLS protocol
• Point-to-point circuit services
• Five megabyte Internet access circuit
• Ten megabyte Internet access
• Internet access-50 Meg
• One hundred megabytes- fast Internet access circuits
• Sip trunking specialists
• Personal, specific and dedicated Internet access
• … and much more

… be sure not to forget what capability and technical solutions meet your business’s specific needs.

Business Internet access for Surfing the Worldwide Web

For most companies in Harrisonburg, Virginia, some or all of the employees need access to the web. Whether it is to talk to shippers, do research or place orders, Internet access is required.

The number of employees you have may determine your best solution. If you have a smaller workforce, you may do fine with a smaller Internet circuit. For example, if you only employ a handful of people, a 5 or 10 Meg circuit may meet your needs. If you have more than that, you may need more.

Perhaps most workers at your company use an intranet system with limited features. High- speed Internet may not be a priority in this case. If your company functions demand the downloading of documents and images or videos on a regular basis, speed becomes a must more important issue.

Do you routinely backup? When you do remote backups from every workstation, which you should, you must support multiple and simultaneous connections to the web in order to sync your backup data.

Do you use a file-sharing service? Perhaps you use Google drive, DropBox or a different service? After a file is saved, it goes to the cloud and then to someone else’s computer. Enough bandwidth is required to support this function along with every other service.

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 Harrisonburg that have already been wired by a carrier. 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. Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet may provide you with high-speed access to The Internet in thirty days or less, depending on availability.

Online Applications Need High-Speed access to The net

Does your business host its own servers to run information feeds, websites or application program interfaces (APIs) with companies or offices located outside of your four walls? Are your business headquarters with a hosted application connected to fifty or more satellite offices? Is your organization 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?

Granting access to outsiders is necessary when you host data and programs at a central location. If the internet connection is interrupted or fails, those people are unable to accomplish any work. When deciding on the right intranet solution for your company, ask yourself: Is the solution going to adequately support simultaneous and multiple connections from my different sites?

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 dedicated circuits, Metro Ethernet or gigabit Ethernet are advisable for company headquarters. While all offer high speeds, they also need to be capable of supporting multiple diverse connections. The support you need could not be provided by a cable modem.

Cable Circuit Sharing in Harrisonburg, Virginia Versus Dedicated Bandwidth: What is Right For You?

Bringing in a cable modem, which seems to save money, may actually come at a price. Oftentimes, a lower monthly rate comes with the realization that you are sharing bandwidth with many different tenants and offices. During peak use hours, you may not be able to reach proper speeds. Cable companies are known to limit or predetermine the amount of bandwidth available for delivery in any particular community. Buildings, offices and tenants within the buildings all must share that amount of bandwidth, whatever it may be. Will you achieve 30-meg speed during the working day? Is getting 7 when you expect 30 a problem?

There are carriers who offer dedicated and even guaranteed bandwidth. With these, bandwidth belongs to you and your business only; no sharing. 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.

For example, with Metro Ethernet, you can receive a guaranteed bandwidth in increments of five Meg circuits, 10 Meg circuits, 50 Meg circuits and 100 Meg circuits. If you want to reach gigabit speeds from your business out to the internet, you can by using a gigabit Internet provider.

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.

Incorporating Redundancy Into Your High Speed Business Internet Circuits in Harrisonburg, Virginia

You can’t control everything. Even with the superior Internet bandwidth products that some carriers offer in Harrisonburg, Virginia, problems arise and circuits can fail. Ask this question: “what can I do to decrease the likelihood of an outage?

You may be a candidate for redundant circuits.

We are primarily talking about two kinds of redundancy.

With the first type of redundancy, you receive multiple circuits from the same carrier. This provides some protection when there are certain failures. Multiple circuits can help for example, when there is a physical line issue or a problem with a router port. 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 security in this, you are still vulnerable under some circumstances.

Bringing in circuits using two distinct providers is the second form of circuit redundancy. Advanced routers and IP address allocations can be utilized to make it look to your users and the public that you have a single circuit. However, despite appearances, they are actually very much separate and are redundant to each other. Diversity redundancy, as this is called, offers you more protection that you might realize. 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.

You should look for redundant circuits from carriers in Harrisonburg that do not have the same physical geographic pathways, in order to get the most redundancy. In other words, try to obtain circuits entering the building from different sides of the building. They would be on outside phone poles or underground conduits in different directions and leading to different places. In this way you have redundancy in different physical directions. If there is an event that causes a regional circuit problem, you have an alternative that is unaffected.

What Are the Costs Associated With Not Adequately Protecting Your Organization High-Speed Internet access?

The cost of dependable access to The web pales in comparison to the cost of unreliable access. Consider these scenarios:

Your office depends upon Voice-over Internet Protocol (VoIP) for its phone service

The carrier you use for your cable modem also provides circuits for a dozen or more tenants in the office building. Any of these tenants may be taking many calls, conducting huge downloads or streaming video during your regular office hours. As they use more bandwidth, there is less for available to meet your requirements. What happens to your phone calls? What about the quality of your calls? Will calls be arbitrarily dropped? Will they be full of static?

Your organization is the central data point for multiple locations

Your office is the hub of your company, whether you are a retail company operating a distributed point of sale (POS) system, an accounting firm sharing databases or a law firm engaged in file sharing. Your primary Internet connection is responsible for granting access to data to all of your sites. This is true whether you have 3 places or 2000 sites. If your circuit goes done, what happens next? Is it just irritating? Is it going to cause tremendous problems? Is work even possible at your other locations? Take new orders? Service existing ones? 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. Do you operate a service where other systems speak with yours by using an application program interface (API)? For example do other systems gain access to yours in order to calculate rates, prices, or to collect information that you serve up? It is possible they will not be able to connect to your servers. If you have repeated outages, how long will they remain a customer?

The phones in your office, which functions as a call center, relies entirely on voice-over Internet protocol (VoIP)

Is the web integral to the proper function of your company? Do you depend on it entirely? What if your representatives can make no outgoing telephone calls because your circuits go down? They are also unable to answer calls. You are now, essentially, out of organization. Even for the most reputable call centers that already know of and use redundancy, is it sufficient? Can you truly rely on your providers? Are they as dependable as they claim? Is the quality of service sufficient for your calls to be clear and reliable?

In Harrisonburg: Selecting the Proper High-Speed Business Access Circuits for Your Company

You clearly have many options. Your decision will be based on different factors including your business needs and your budget. As a wrap-up:

Your Small Organization and Access to the Internet

If you are a small business, with just one location and not concerned about redundancy, a single five meg, 10 meg or 50 meg Internet access circuit may be adequate. Gigabit service and Metro Ethernet options seem expensive. If you are in a lit building, however, they can be less than you think. Look into it. Prices change based on your location and the availability of circuits. Please speak with our engineers about what options best suit your needs.

Internet Access for the Mid-Sized Business with One Location

You will need higher speed access to The web if you have a medium sized company in Harrisonburg. Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and other higher-speed Internet circuits are your options. Using different circuits and different providers will, if you choose, provide you with redundancy. Achieving this may not be as costly as you first thought. Using one 100-megabyte circuit instead of two 50-megabyte circuits, is one example. Remember, costs vary. So does availability. Call one of our experts to learn what is available in your specific area.

Internet Access for Mid-Sized Businesses with Several Locations

Any company with more than one location suffers the greatest risk of problems. Redundancy is extremely crucial to them. Having several providers would afford extra protection. Also, redundant equipment such as switches and routers in your facility can minimize the risk of downtime. Have you looked at Metro Ethernet providers, gigabit Internet providers and other high-speed access to The net circuit providers? You should do so before making a decision. The right combination of services and providers can positively impact the efficiency of your business.

Clients who provide services delivered via Internet, large corporate and enterprise clientele

For businesses that fit this description, it is essential to have gigabit Internet circuits, point-to-point high-speed Internet circuits and Metro Ethernet Internet circuits. You absolutely need redundant circuits from different providers as well as redundant hardware. This is vital to ensuring uptime. You need to provide sufficient bandwidth to handle usage spikes without slowdowns or interruptions. It is crucial that not only your circuits have the ability to support a vast number of multiple and simultaneous connects, but your hardware must have the ability to support them as well.

You May Receive an Internet Need and Internet Demand Analysis for Free

Your organization faces great risk of less than adequate bandwidth and failing circuits. Your ideal single circuit or multiple circuits should stay within your budget while still meeting your demands. You have to select the optimal combination of hardware and circuits, which is a daunting task.

Our engineers will take the pressure off and develop a free action plan for you by analyzing your needs. We will look at your current usage, demand levels and scope out a design to give you the resources you need while keeping your company up and running at a reasonable cost.

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 done in as few as two days or within 48 hours.