High Speed Internet Access in Houston

Houston, Texas High Speed Access to The Internet: Metro Ethernet Access, Gigabit Internet and Company Broadband Internet

Today’s environment demands that companies in Houston have reliable Internet service in order to run their company. The company functions of every company, whether it is a small company or on the Fortune 500, from Fortune 500, depends upon fast and reliable Internet access.

Our reliance on access to the web will become greater in the near and distant future.

The use of the web is pervasive. We use it for email and data sharing, video chat and VOIP, archiving and commerce. How can your needs be met? Will a cable modem be adequate? Is Metro Ethernet necessary? You may need Gigabit Internet. Your Houston organization probably needs a 5 Meg Internet circuit, 10 Meg access to The net, a 50 Meg circuit, or a 100 Meg access to The web point but which one is best?

Internet Access: Defining the Company Need

The needs of your particular organization must be determined before you can select an appropriate service. Will web surfing and email be your primary use of the net? Is it used to network with cloud servers? You may be hosting the data in Houston, Texas and remote places rely on this.

What if you have a disruption in your high-speed Internet? What about the downtime that results? Can your organization afford that? Is your success reliant on uptime? Before buying, these are several of the questions that you must answer.

Looking at Different High Speed Internet Solutions: Houston, Texas

Speaking broadly, all companies need high-speed access to the web. When picking the correct broadband, balancing the costs and benefits to your organization is imperative. While various providers will throw around terminology like:

• High-speed access to The Internet provider
• Business Internet or commercial Internet
• Broadband cable modems are our specialty
• Metro Ethernet experts
• GbE or Gigabit Ethernet
• MPLS protocol
• Services related to point-to-point circuits
• five Meg Internet access circuits
• Ten megabyte Internet access
• 50 Meg access to The net circuits
• Internet access circuits- One hundred Meg
• Session Initiation Protocol/ Sip trunk
• Internet access dedicated to your needs
• … and that is only a few

… the actual issue is knowing what technology and capability can satisfy your needs.

Business Internet access for Website Surfing

For many, if not all, companies in Houston, Texas, access to The web is needed for at least some employees. It may be needed for organization research, to order office supplies or other reasons.

The number of workers you employ, may be the most important factor in your decision making process. If you have a handful of employees, a 5 or 10 Meg Internet circuit may be adequate. If your organization has nearly 50 people, however, and they all need to use the web at the same time, you may find that more is better.

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. When they are frequently downloading things, whether documents, graphics or videos, however, speed is necessary for efficient job performance.

Do you perform backups at your company? 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 like Google drive or DropBox? When you save a file it is pushed to the cloud. Then it is synched to the computer or computers of someone else. You must have sufficient bandwidth if you are to successfully support every service including file sharing.

Company high-speed access to The web may interest you. Depending on your location, you may have options such as gigabit Internet or Metro Ethernet. These are typically found in “lit buildings” in Houston, Texas. Providers have already wired these buildings. Adding this high-speed Internet to your office may be surprisingly affordable and easy.

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. In fact, in as little as 30 days, you may be able to obtain high-speed access to the net with either gigabit Internet or Metro Ethernet. It depends upon availability.

Web Applications Require Fast Internet Access

Do you have your own company servers that run APIs, websites or feeds for offsite offices or companies? Are your corporate headquarters with a hosted application utilized by 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?

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. When deciding on the right intranet solution for your organization, ask yourself: Is the solution going to adequately support simultaneous and multiple connections from my different places?

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. For headquarters, Metro Ethernet, gigabit Ethernet or other high-speed Internet dedicated circuits is advisable. High-speed alone is not enough. They must also need to be capable of supporting many diverse connections. A cable modem would likely not provide the necessary support.

Dedicated Internet Bandwidth in Houston V. Shared Cable Circuits

In many cases, installing an inexpensive cable modem comes at a price. Oftentimes, a lower monthly rate comes with the realization that you are sharing bandwidth with many different tenants and offices. The cable modem you subscribe to with the 30 Meg connections may not always reach those speeds, especially during the busiest or “peak” hours of the workday. Cable operators differ but many have prescribed limits on the bandwidth amount that they can deliver within a set community. That bandwidth reaches out like branches to every building in the community and the people living and working in those buildings. Will you achieve 30-meg speed during the working day? Is this a problem for you if you expect 30 and get 6?

You can find a carrier who can provide dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth. In this situation, you do not have to share bandwidth. The bandwidth is all yours and is fully allocated to the needs of your organization. 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. 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.

Redundant High Speed Organization Internet in Houston: Why More Circuits?

The truth is that circuits can go down in Houston even though some providers offer superior Internet bandwidth products. You must ask yourself: “how do I lessen the chance of an outage? ”

Redundant circuits may be the answer for you.

There are, in essence, two types of redundancy.

A single carrier, providing multiple circuits, to one customer, characterizes one form of redundancy. 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 carriers is the second kind of redundancy. Using advanced routers and IP address allocations, you can bind these connections together so that, to your users and to the public, it appears and behaves as a single circuit. However, despite appearances, they are actually very much separate and are redundant to each other. Diversity redundancy provides greater assurance, comfort and protection. In the event that one carrier goes down, the other will still be alive.

You should look for redundant circuits from providers in Houston, Texas that do not have the same physical geographic pathways, in order to get the most redundancy. If at all possible, you want to obtain circuits entering the premises on different sides. 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 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.

What Will Not Having Enough Protection for Your Business Class High Speed Internet Cost You?

Even though access to The Internet 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. Think about the following situations:

Your office relies on 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. 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. How will your telephone calls be affected as the amount of available bandwidth decreases? How will it affect the quality of that telephone call? Will calls be arbitrarily dropped? Perhaps you will sound choppy or will be inaudible.

Your office or business is the main location for data and functions in that role for multiple locations

Whether you are a law firm doing file sharing, an accounting practice sharing databases or a retailer operating a distributed point-of-sale system, 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 will happen in the event of a circuit failure? Would it annoy you or destroy you? Can your satellite or remote office do any work at all? What happens to new orders? Can they be taken or processed? Share information? Choosing the right solution depends largely on assessing and understanding the specific needs of your company. Maybe your software company runs a hosted solution. Maybe that hosted solution is used by hundreds of your customers. You may operate a service like this: other systems communicate with yours via an API to figure out freight rates, stock prices, to compile weather data or receive any other information that you provide. You may find that they are unable to reach or connect with your business servers. If you have repeated outages, how long will they remain a customer?

Your call center uses VoIP

Maybe your organization depends entirely on the internet. Should your circuits stop working, imagine your people being unable to make any outbound phone calls. Your reps have no way of answering calls, if they even know they are coming in. Looks like you are now 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? 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?

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

Obviously, there are a variety of choices. The needs and budget of your business will both affect your choices. Essentially:

If You Have a Small Organization That Needs Internet Access

If your organization is small, with one location or office, you are likely not concerned about redundancy. For you, a single 5, 10 or 50 megabyte access to The web circuit may suffice. For an office in a lit building, you may find that gigabit service or Metro Ethernet are affordable options for you. Prices change based on your location and the availability of circuits. Please speak with our engineers about what options best suit your needs.

Mid-Sized Businesses access to The Internet – One Location

Mid sized companies with a single office in Houston, need higher speed Internet access. Gigabit Internet, Metro Ethernet and other higher speed Internet circuits are options to consider. In a perfect scenario, multiple circuits from different providers will give you the most redundancy. You may be able to achieve this in a manner that will not break the bank. For instance, it may be cheaper to utilize two 50 meg circuits in place of one 100 meg circuit. To repeat, availability and prices vary. Your specific location will determine what options you have. Please speak with one of our experts to find out what those are and how we can meet your needs.

Midsized Businesses with Multiple Sites: Internet Access

What companies have the highest risk for failure; those with multiple locations. They need redundant circuits. Multiple providers would be great. Additionally, you should consider redundant equipment (routers and switches) in your facility to minimize the risk of downtime. Here too, take a careful look and choose the right Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers, gigabit Internet providers and other high-speed Internet access circuit providers. The correct combination of providers and services can keep your company running smoothly and efficiently.

What about enterprise clients and large corporate clients? What about clients who provide services that rely on the internet for delivery of said services?

Companies such as these require the following: Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and point-to-point (PPP) high-speed Internet circuits. You must have redundant circuits for multiple providers as well as redundant hardware in your office to ensure your uptime. Having plenty of bandwidth will help avoid interruptions or decreased speed that sometimes occurs during spikes in usage. Be sure to have the right circuits and hardware. They both must be able to support multiple, fast, concurrent connections.

Internet Demand and Internet Need: Receive Free Analysis

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. The pressure involved in selecting the proper mix of hardware and circuits can be overwhelming.

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. You want your organization to run smoothly. We will look at your current usage levels and demand levels and design a plan that meets your needs at a cost that makes sense for you.

Please click here to complete the contact form on the right side of this page or call our office to schedule an appointment for an assessment. It can take as little as 48 hours to provide a complete assessment.