The lifeblood of Marlborough companies doing business in the current environment depends upon reliable Internet access. Fast and reliable Internet access is needed for businesses to function properly; large corporations and small companies alike.
Our reliance on access to the internet 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 conferencing and VOIP, archiving and commerce. What solution bet fits your needs? Maybe a cable modem is a sufficient solution. Is Metro Ethernet necessary? Gigabit Internet? What does your Marlborough company need? Does it require 10 Meg Internet access, a 100 Meg access to The net point, a 50 Meg circuit or a 5 Meg circuit?
You must, before selecting a service, assess the actual needs of your company. Will web surfing and email be your primary use of the internet? Is connecting with cloud servers and sharing real time data the main use of the internet? You may be hosting the data in Marlborough and remote sites rely on this.
How would an outage to your high-speed Internet affect your organization? Will your company suffer from the lull? Does your company require uptime? These types of questions must be answered before you make purchase anything.
It is no secret that all companies need high-speed access to the net. Before you choose your broadband, look at the costs and benefits. Performing this analysis is an important step in picking the right one for your company. While many providers like to spout technical terminologies such as:
… focus on what matters: what does your business need and what are the best services and solutions out there to meet those needs?
For most companies in Marlborough, some or all of the employees need access to the web. There are countless reasons to need access to the net. Perhaps it is to order materials, to conduct business research or speak with clients.
Perhaps the size of your work force may determine the solution that best fits your needs. A smaller Internet circuit may be enough if you only have a handful of workers. Perhaps a 5 or 10 megabyte is all you need. 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.
If your employees are merely accessing an intranet system with limited graphics and video, your need for high-speed Internet may be reduced. On the other hand, if your company requires that its employees download many documents or images and videos, Internet speed becomes more important.
Are you performing backups? It is recommended that you do remote backups from every desk. If you are, you will need to support simultaneous connections out to the web to synchronize the backup data to collect.
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. The right amount of capacity or bandwidth is necessary to support this function in conjunction with every other service you have.
Business high-speed access to The web may interest you. Depending on your location, you may have options such as gigabit Internet or Metro Ethernet. “Lit buildings” that have already been wired by a carrier, are commonly the site for these. It may be shock you to know that installing high-speed Internet access may not be particularly expensive or inconvenient.
The introduction of Metro Ethernet into a new building can be quite costly. However, bringing that connection into office space within that building is usually less so. 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.
Ask yourself this: Does we host our own servers to run APIs, websites and data feeds to external offices or company premises? Are your corporate headquarters with a hosted application utilized by 50 branch offices? Are you a retail company hosting the POS system for thousands of chain stores? Are you an attorney with offices multiple cities or states? Do you have one office hosting data for several sites?
Access to data and programs by people outside of your main location becomes necessary when you host information centrally. Those people are not able to work without a solid Internet connection. Can your intranet solution support your needs? Can it support multiple simultaneous connections? Is it stable enough to handle this when they are from various sites?
A cost friendly 10 Meg circuit or even a cable modem may satisfy the needs of a business with a single office that needs to surf the web. High-speed dedicated circuits, Metro Ethernet or gigabit Ethernet are advisable for company headquarters. While fast access to The Internet is and important, they must also have the capability to handle assorted simultaneous connections. A cable modem would likely be insufficient.
Bringing in a less-expensive circuit like a cable modem often comes with a price. You may save money on your monthly bill but the bandwidth you get must be shared among many people. While you may subscribe to a cable modem with a 30 Meg connection, you may be unable to reach those speeds during peak hours. Cable companies are known to limit or predetermine the amount of bandwidth available for delivery in any particular community. 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? Is getting 7 when you expect 30 a problem?
There are carriers who offer dedicated and even guaranteed bandwidth. In this situation, your bandwidth is not shared but is fully allocated to your company. 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. If you want to reach gigabit speeds from your organization out to the web, 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.
The truth is that circuits can go down in Marlborough, Massachusetts even though some providers offer superior Internet bandwidth products. You must ask yourself: “how do I lessen the chance of an outage? ”
Consider redundant circuits.
There are two types of redundancy to consider.
A single carrier, providing multiple circuits, to one customer, characterizes one form of redundancy. 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 there is some security in this, you are still vulnerable under some circumstances.
The second way to set up circuit redundancy is by using two different providers 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. You know the truth: that they are individual circuits and are there to back each other up in case one goes down. 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.
The providers you choose for your redundant circuits should have different physical pathways in Marlborough, Massachusetts. This is an important consideration when trying to obtain the most redundancy. This means that you should try to have the circuits come into you building from different sides. The circuits would be attached to telephone poles (or underground conduits) in different directions leading to different data centers or central offices. This way, if there is a major catastrophe, such as a fire at a data center or a major accident impacting circuits within a region, you have redundancy in a different physical direction.
The cost to your company if you do not have reliable access to The net will be far greater than you may realize. Think about the following situations:
Your organization is on a cable modem and your carrier provides circuits to 20 other offices in your building. Any of these tenants may be taking many calls, conducting huge downloads or streaming video during your regular office hours. As available bandwidth shrinks, what will happen to your calls? How will the caliber of the call be affected? 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 company. 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 locations. What happens if your circuit goes down? Will it cause disastrous results of just annoy you a little bit? Can meaningful work be conducted at your remote offices? What will happen to new orders? Can they be taken or processed? Share information? Before choosing a solution, be sure to assess and really understand what your business requires. You might have hundreds and hundreds of loyal customers. Perhaps you are a software company running a hosted solution they all depend on. You operate a service that utilizes API in order to grant access to other systems. They may use this to collect whatever data you are offering such as commodity prices, weather data or freight calculations. What if you have server problems and they are unable to connect to you? How long will your customers tolerate repeated outages?
Does your business completely rely on the internet? If your circuits go down, you cannot make calls. Your reps have no way of answering calls, if they even know they are coming in. You are essentially out of company. Is redundancy enough? Are your current providers as dependable as you would like? Is the quality of service sufficient for your calls to be clear and reliable?
You have several different options to pick from. Your organization budget and needs will play a large part in your decision-making. In summary:
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 web circuit may be sufficient. Is your building lit? If so, find out about gigabit or Metro Ethernet services. They 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 Marlborough, need higher speed access to The net. Your choices include: Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet or other high-speed circuits. In a perfect scenario, multiple circuits from different providers will give you the most redundancy. You can sometimes achieve this without doubling costs. Two 50-megabyte circuits may be more cost effective than a single 100 circuit. To repeat, availability and prices vary. Speaking with one of our experts will help you determine the options available in your specific location.
Companies with multiple locations are most at risk for failure. They require redundant circuits. Different providers are desirable. Also, redundant equipment such as switches and routers in your facility can minimize the risk of downtime. 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 correct combination of providers and services can keep your organization running smoothly and efficiently.
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 carriers as well as redundant hardware. 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.
Insufficient bandwidth and failing circuits are present tremendous risk to your company. It is imperative that the circuit or circuits you choose meet your needs but also keep you within your allowable 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. We will 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 business.
Please call our office for an assessment appointment or click here to complete the contact form on the right side of the page. Your assessment may be finished within as little as 48 hours.