In today’s environment, companies in Kettering, Ohio rely on reliable access to The net as the lifeblood of their company. The company functions of every company, whether it is a small business or on the Fortune 500, from Fortune 500, depends upon fast and reliable Internet access.
Our dependence on Internet access will continue to grow in the coming months and years.
From video conferencing to voice over IP, email to data sharing and data archiving to Internet commerce, the net is everywhere you look. What solution bet fits your needs? Is a cable modem enough? Metro Ethernet may be what you need. Gigabit Internet? Does your company in Kettering 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 organization must figure out its needs. Perhaps the net is only used for a few things such as email communication or surfing the web. Is real time data connection with cloud servers vital to your company? Do remote sites rely on you hosting the data in Kettering, Ohio?
Have you thought about what will happen to your business if your high-speed Internet is interrupted by an outage? How might the downtime cause problems for your business? Is uptime required? You must answer these questions before you buy.
High-speed access to the internet is something all companies need. When choosing the right broadband for business, you need to analyze and balance the costs and benefits. While many providers like to spout technical terminologies such as:
… do not stray from the real issues. Focus on what your company’s needs are and what capabilities and technical solutions will help satisfy them.
Most companies in Kettering require that some or all of their workers have access to the internet. It may be needed for company research, to order office supplies or other reasons.
Your best course of action may be determined by the size of your work force. An Internet circuit of 5 -10 megabytes might be enough for your company if you only have a few people working for you. 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.
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, when they are frequently downloading documents, images and videos, that need for speed increases drastically.
Do you backup information? 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.
Google drive and DropBox are two popular sharing services. Are you using one of these or some other service that allows you to share files? The saved files go to the cloud and are then synchronized or “shared” 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 organization access to The net if you location warrants it. Gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet may be viable options for you. These can usually be found in Kettering, Ohio in “lit buildings” that have already been wired. You may be surprised by how easy and affordable it is to add high-speed Internet to your company.
While bringing Metro Ethernet to a new building can be an expensive proposition, bringing that connection to a suite within the building is not. Did you know that obtaining high-speed Internet access with Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet can often take 30 days or less? Of course, this depends upon availability.
Consider whether your company hosts its own servers that run APIs, websites and/or data to outside buildings, offices or companies. Are your business headquarters with a hosted application connected to fifty or more satellite offices? Perhaps you are in retail and host the point of sale (POS) system for thousands of stores? Are you an attorney with offices multiple cities or states? Do you have one office hosting data for several sites?
When data, programs, or information is hosted centrally, those outside your office must gain access. People can’t work if you have no Internet connection. Are you choosing an intranet solution that is sufficiently reliable and stable to support multiple simultaneous connections from varied places?
An inexpensive 10 Meg circuit may be enough if you have one office that needs to surf the internet. A cable modem may also be adequate in this situation. Metro Ethernet, gigabit Ethernet or other high-speed dedicated circuits is advisable for the headquarters where high-speed Internet access is important. High-speed alone is not enough. They must also need to be capable of supporting many diverse connections. A cable modem would likely be insufficient.
Utilizing a cable modem or other less expensive circuit may seem like a good option but can result in unexpected cost. Oftentimes, a lower monthly rate comes with the realization that you are sharing bandwidth with many different tenants and offices. You may experience slow downs. For example, although you subscribe to a cable modem with a thirty Meg connection, it can be difficult to maintain the maximum speed during busy times and peak hours. Cable operators are only permitted to establish a certain amount of bandwidth within communities. Different buildings and tenants housed or working within those buildings all share that set amount of bandwidth. With a 30-megabyte connection, you may not get to that 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. In this situation, you do not have to share bandwidth. The bandwidth is all yours and is fully allocated to the needs of your company. 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. Gigabit speeds from your office to the web can be reached if you use a gigabit Internet provider.
In these situations, each tenant receives their contracted high-speed. The carrier delivers enough so they can split their circuit and provide enough to each tenant.
You can’t control everything. Even with the superior Internet bandwidth products that some providers offer in Kettering, Ohio, problems arise and circuits can fail. Ask this question: “what can I do to decrease the likelihood of an outage?
Redundant circuits.
Essentially, there are two different ways to look at 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. 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.
Circuit redundancy can also be achieved in the following way: Import circuits using two different and distinct carriers. By using IP address allocations and certain routers, you can bind your connections. By doing this, it appears and behaves as a single circuit. In reality, they are completely separate and redundant to each other. This is called diversity redundancy and offers more protection that the first. If one carrier has a problem, the other likely will not.
You should look for redundant circuits from carriers in Kettering, Ohio that do not have the same physical geographic pathways, in order to get the most redundancy. Alternatively stated, try to have your circuits enter the building on different sides from one another. They would be on outside phone poles or underground conduits in different directions and leading to different places. 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.
Although access to The net comes at a price, the price of unreliable access to The Internet is tremendous. Please consider these situations:
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 requirements. What will happen to your phone calls? What happens to the strength and quality of that call? Will calls be arbitrarily dropped? Perhaps you will sound choppy or will be inaudible.
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. All of your locations, you may have 2, you may have 500, you may have 4, 000, rely on your main Internet connection to access and receive data. If your circuit goes done, what happens next? Would it annoy you or destroy you? How much work, if any, can be done by your remote sites? Can they take or process any orders at all? Share information? It is important that prior to choosing a solution, you understand the true needs and requirements of your particular organization. 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. Maybe you offer a service that allows other systems use an application program interface (API) to communicate with you to collect information and data. 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 reliant on the web. Your employees or representatives will not be able to make outgoing phone calls if your circuits go down. They are also unable to answer calls. You are essentially out of organization. Is redundancy enough? Make sure your carriers are as reliable as possible. Is the quality of service sufficient? Are your calls clear and reliable?
Clearly, there are many choices. Your choices will largely count on your budget, in addition to the other requirements of your organization. In summary:
You are probably not thinking about redundancy if you have a small company with a single location. In this case, you can probably get by with a single Internet access circuit of 5, 10 or 50 meg. Metro Ethernet service or gigabit service may also be a reasonably priced option if you are in a lit building. Prices vary based on your location and availability of circuits; speak with our engineers to find your best option.
If you have a midsized organization in Kettering, you will need higher-speed access to The web. Your options are Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and higher speed circuits. In a perfect scenario, multiple circuits from different providers will give you the most redundancy. Achieving this may cost extra but it won’t double your costs. Two 50-megabyte circuits may be more cost effective than a single 100 circuit. Do not forget that you will find variations in price and availability. In order to find out the options available for you, in your location, you need to speak with one of our seasoned experts.
Businesses with many sites face the greatest risk for failure. Redundancy is extremely essential to them. Multiple providers are highly desirable. You can decrease risk during downtime by having redundant equipment as well. Here also, examine the Ethernet access services, gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet providers. Take a careful look at other high-speed access to The net circuit providers before choosing the right one. Your organization can benefit from finding the right mix of services and providers.
For companies falling in this category, gigabit Internet circuits, Metro Ethernet Internet circuits and point-to-point high-speed Internet circuits are essential. If you want to ensure your valuable uptime, have redundant circuits from multiple providers as well as redundant hardware. You must have the bandwidth to withstand sharp increases in usage. Doing so will help protect you from slowdowns or interruptions. The hardware and circuits you choose must both be able to support the following: a great number of concurrent, speedy connections.
Your organization faces great risk of less than adequate bandwidth and failing circuits. It is imperative that the circuit or circuits you choose meet your needs but also keep you within your allowable budget. It is crucial 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 engineers that will analyze your needs, look at your company requirements and develop an action plan for you… for free!Our experts will examine your current usage and demand. We will then generate a design that gives you the resources you need while keeping your organization up and running 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.