These days, companies in North Miami rely on reliable Internet access as the lifeblood of their company. Fast and reliable Internet access is needed for businesses to function properly; large corporations and small companies alike.
We are going to, in the months and years ahead, become more and more dependent on our access to The net.
The Internet is ubiquitous. From email to data sharing, archiving to commerce and VOIP to video chat, the internet is everywhere. What can best meet your needs? Is a cable modem enough? Metro Ethernet may be what you need. Would Gigabit Internet suffice? Does your North Miami business need a 5 Meg Internet circuit, 10 Meg access to The Internet, a 50 Meg circuit, or a 100 Meg access to The web point?
Before choosing an adequate or appropriate service, you must decide what your company really needs. Is Internet use limited to website surfing or emailing only? Is it used for real-time data connection with cloud servers? Perhaps you, in North Miami, are hosting the data and remote sites depend upon this.
What if your high-speed Internet is disrupted by an outage? What will happen to your organization? How will the downtime affect your business? Is uptime required? You must answer questions like these so you can make a purchase that actually meets your needs
It is no secret that all companies need high-speed access to the net. Choosing the correct broadband for your organization requires a cost benefit analysis. While various providers will throw around terminology like:
… the actual issue is knowing what technology and capability can satisfy your needs.
For most companies in North Miami, some or all of the employees need access to the internet. 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. An Internet circuit of 5 -10 megabytes might be enough for your business if you only have a few people working for you. If you have many employees who need to use the web at the same time, you may do better with 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. If your company functions demand the downloading of documents and images or videos on a regular basis, speed becomes a must more important issue.
Does your organization regularly conduct backups? If you are doing remote backups from every desk, which is advisable, you will need to be able to support simultaneous connections out to the web to synchronize 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. You must have sufficient bandwidth if you are to successfully support every service including file sharing.
Company high-speed Internet access 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. If you’d like to install high-speed Internet in your office, you should know that it might be more affordable than you realize.
Absent the need to introduce Metro Ethernet into a new building, it is not particularly costly to connect Metro Ethernet to a suite or office within that building. In fact, obtaining high-speed access to The Internet with Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet can often take 30 days or less depending upon availability.
Your company may host its own servers. Do they run websites APIs or data feeds for external offices? Maybe your business requires that dozens of satellite offices have access to a hosted application at your company main headquarters. Does your office host the point of sale (POS) system for every single store in a large retail chain? Are you a law firm hosting data for multiple office locations?
When things are hosted at a central point, parties outside the office must somehow gain access. If your Internet connection goes down, those people are unable to 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?
For a single office surfing the web, a cable modem or inexpensive 10 Meg circuit may be adequate. It is advisable that high-speed Internet access be available at the central company office or headquarters, including gigabit Ethernet, Metro Ethernet or some other high-speed dedicated circuits. High speed is important but they also must be able to support multiple distinct connections. This could probably not be accomplished with a cable modem.
Utilizing a cable modem or other less expensive circuit may seem like a good option but can result in unexpected cost. Even though you pay less money per month you must consider that the bandwidth you receive may be shared and used by multiple parties in the building. While you may subscribe to a cable modem with a 30 Meg connection, you may be unable to reach those speeds during peak hours. Often, within a given community, cable companies may only deliver a particular amount of bandwidth. 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? If you expect 30 but only get 6, will you have problems?
There are carriers who offer dedicated and even 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. 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.
Metro Ethernet provides guaranteed bandwidth in increments as follows: 5, 10, 50 and 100 Meg circuits. With gigabit Internet providers, you can reach gigabit speeds in your office out to the internet.
Providers in these situations deliver enough to cover everyone’s needs. The providers divide their circuit to various tenants while guaranteeing that everyone gets their contracted speed.
Despite outstanding Internet bandwidth products offered by providers in North Miami, circuits do go down. The question then becomes, “how do I minimize my chance of an outage? ”
Consider redundant circuits.
There are, in reality, two kinds of redundancy.
With the first kind, you receive several circuits but they all come from the same carrier. When there are problems with a physical line or a port or other failures, it can be helpful to have redundant circuits. 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 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. By using IP address allocations and certain routers, you can bind your connections. By doing this, it appears and behaves as a single circuit. You know the truth: that they are individual circuits and are there to back each other up in case one goes down. While circuit redundancy in general is a good idea, diversity redundancy by using different providers, offers far better protection. You will still have a live, fully functioning carrier if one fails.
You want maximum redundancy. In order to achieve this, look for redundant circuits from different carriers with different physical geographic pathways in North Miami. Alternatively stated, try to have your circuits enter the building on different sides from one another. The circuits would be attached underground or to telephone poles, in various directions. The circuits would go to different data centers or central offices. If you can accomplish this, you are protected from a major catastrophe. For example, if a there is a fire or some other accident that negatively affects circuits in a region, you have redundancy in a physically different direction.
Internet access costs money but the cost of NOT having reliable Internet access is greater. Think about the following situations:
The carrier you use for your cable modem also provides circuits for a dozen or more tenants in the office building. It is possible that during normal company hours, those tenants might be downloading large files or watching continuous videos. They might be getting a lot of phone calls. How will your telephone calls be affected as the amount of available bandwidth decreases? How will the quality of that phone call be affected? Will you lose calls? Will you sound muffled?
Your office is the hub of your enterprise: You might be a law practice that shares files, a retail operation that utilizes POS systems or a large accounting firm that needs to share databases. Your primary Internet connection is solely responsible for smoothly granting access and sending data to all of your locations whether you have two or two thousand. Your circuit goes down, now what happens? Would you merely be annoyed? Would there be catastrophic consequences? Can your satellite offices perform any work at all? Process new orders? Share essential data? Before choosing a solution, be sure to assess and really understand what your business requires. 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 if these other systems have difficulty connecting your servers? Multiple outages may annoy your customers.
What if your business could not function at all without the internet? Maybe your business depends upon it completely. Should your circuits go down, your representatives cannot make outbound calls. Calls coming in would be unanswerable. You might not even know people are trying to reach your office. Basically, you are out of company. While most reputable call centers are already aware and using redundancy, is it enough? Are you really getting the dependable service you need form your carriers? Are you using providers that are truly reliable? Do you consistently get quality service that provides clear and reliable calls?
You have no shortage of options. Your choices will largely rely on your budget, in addition to the other requirements of your business. To summarize:
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 net circuit may suffice. Find out if you are in a lit building. If so, the price of Metro Ethernet or gigabit service may be affordable. Because prices can vary based on the location of your company and the availability of circuits, speak with our engineers to learn your options.
If you have a midsized company in North Miami, Florida, you will need higher-speed access to The Internet. Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and other higher-speed Internet circuits are your options. Optimally, multiple providers and multiple circuits will give you the most redundancy. This may be attainable without doubling your costs. For example, choosing two 50 meg circuits versus one 100 meg circuit. As a reminder; availability and costs may vary. Learn your options by speaking with one of our knowledgeable experts. We can help you determine what is available in your specific location.
Companies with multiple locations are most at risk for failure. They require redundant circuits. Multiple carriers would be great. Additionally, you should consider redundant equipment (routers and switches) in your facility to minimize the risk of downtime. Look at all of your options: Ethernet access services, gigabit Internet providers, Metro Ethernet providers and other high-speed circuit providers. The right mix of carriers and services will help keep your business up and running 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. Both your hardware and circuits must be capable of supporting a vast number of simultaneous and fast connections.
Do you understand how great the risk of failing circuits and insufficient bandwidth really is? You need to have the right circuit or circuits to meet your demands while staying within your budget. There is tremendous pressure on you to choose the best combination of circuits and hardware.
Our engineers can analyze your needs and create a free action plan for you. We’ll examine your current usage and demand levels then create a design that provides you with the resources you need to keep your business running smoothly at a reasonable cost.
Please call our office for an assessment appointment or click here to complete the contact form on the right side of the page. We do assessments quickly. It can take as little as 48 hours to complete your analysis.