In today’s world, Ogden companies need dependable Internet access. It is the lifeblood of their organization. All companies, large and small, need fast and reliable access to The Internet.
Internet access will become increasingly essential to us in the coming months and years. Our dependence on Internet access will only grow as time goes on.
The net has a significant presence in our lives. From email to information sharing, data archiving to e-commerce, and VOIP to video conferencing, the net is certainly ubiquitous. What can best meet your needs? Is a cable modem sufficient? Metro Ethernet may be what you need. Gigabit Internet? Your Ogden company probably needs a 5 Meg Internet circuit, 10 Meg access to The web, a 50 Meg circuit, or a 100 Meg access to The web point but which one is best?
Prior to selecting a service, your organization must figure out its needs. Will web surfing and email be your primary use of the web? Will real-time data connection with servers in the cloud be the primary use of the internet? Do remote locations depend on you hosting the data in Ogden?
What will happen to your business if your high-speed Internet experiences an outage? How much downtime can your organization withstand? Is uptime essential to the success of your business? Prior to making any purchases, you must determine the answers to these questions.
Speaking broadly, all companies need high-speed access to the web. You need to analyze and balance the costs and benefits to your company before choosing the right broadband. While you are likely to hear some providers toss around terms such as:
… be sure not to forget what capability and technical solutions meet your business’s specific needs.
For many, if not all, companies in Ogden, access to The net is needed for at least some employees. Third party applications, organization research or development and e-commerce are just a few of the ways the web may be needed.
The solution you choose may be based on the number of employees you have or expect to have. A 5 or 10 megabyte Internet circuit may be perfect if you only have a few employees. You may need more if you have more workers and those workers all need to be on the net during the same hours.
You may not need as much high-speed access to The net if your employees work primarily on 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 perform backups at your company? Synchronizing your backup data after doing remote backups from every desk requires you to support simultaneous connections out to the web.
Does your organization use a file sharing service? DropBox? Google drive? As people save files, those files are pushed to the cloud and then synchronized back to other people’s computers. Enough bandwidth is required to support this function along with every other service.
Depending on where you are, you may want to look into high-speed organization Internet access such as Metro Ethernet and gigabit Internet. Usually, you can find these in “lit buildings” in Ogden that have been previously wired by a carrier. 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. Depending on availability, it is often possible to obtain high-speed access to The Internet with Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet in 30 days or less.
Consider whether your business hosts its own servers that run APIs, websites and/or data to outside buildings, offices or companies. Do your headquarters have a hosted Internet application that must be accessed regularly by 40 or 50 branch offices? Are you hosting the point of sale (POS) system for 15, 000 retail chain stores? Are you a legal practice hosting the data for three locations?
When data and programs are hosted centrally at one main site, people outside that location must gain access. Those people are not able to do their work if the internet connection fails or is unreliable. Are you picking an intranet solution that provides reliability and stability for your multiple, simultaneous connections from various locations?
An inexpensive 10 Meg circuit may be enough if you have one office that needs to surf the web. A cable modem may also be adequate in this situation. 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. The support you need could not be provided by a cable modem.
Bringing in a less-expensive circuit like a cable modem often comes with a price. Oftentimes, a lower monthly rate comes with the realization that you are sharing bandwidth with many different tenants and offices. During peak hours, your connection may slow down, even though you subscribe to a cable modem with a thirty-megabyte connection. Many cable companies only deliver a set amount of bandwidth within a community. That bandwidth reaches out like branches to every building in the community and the people living and working in those buildings. You might be capped at 30-megabyte speed, but may never be able to actually reach that speed during the important hours of your business day. If you expect 30 but only get 6, will you have problems?
There are carriers who offer dedicated and even guaranteed bandwidth. With these options, bandwidth is yours. It is not shared with anyone outside of your business. Regardless of neighbors, or other tenants, you should have the full capacity of your circuit at all times.
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. Gigabit Internet providers offer gigabit speeds from your office to the net.
Providers in these situations deliver enough to cover everyone’s needs. The carriers divide their circuit to various tenants while guaranteeing that everyone gets their contracted speed.
Realistically, while some providers in Ogden offer excellent Internet bandwidth products, it is possible for a circuit to go down. You must ask yourself: “how do I lessen the chance of an outage? ”
Try using redundant circuits.
There are two types of redundancy to consider.
The first type is when one single carrier provides you with multiple circuits. In this situation, the redundancy helps protect you from port issues or physical line issues. 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 offering some protection, it is not without risk.
Utilizing circuits from two different carriers is the second kind of redundancy. For users and the public, you can make it look like you have one cohesive circuit. You can also make the connections act as a single circuit. You can do this with various advanced routers and IP address allocations. In reality, they are completely separate and redundant to each other. You will get more substantial protection from this diversity redundancy. Should one carrier have some trouble that extends to a greater area and is out of your control, you are backed up with a different carrier.
You want maximum redundancy. In order to achieve this, look for redundant circuits from different carriers with different physical geographic pathways in Ogden. Your goal should be to get circuits coming into your building on different sides. You do not want them on the same side. The circuits would be attached to telephone poles (or underground conduits) in different directions leading to different data centers or central offices. Having redundancy in different physical directions can protect you if there is a serious incident at a data center or some accident that causes a regional circuit issue.
The cost to your company if you do not have reliable Internet access will be far greater than you may realize. Consider these scenarios:
You are on a cable modem with the carrier providing circuits to 14 other tenants in your building. Any of these tenants may be taking many calls, conducting huge downloads or streaming video during your regular office hours. How will your telephone calls be affected as the amount of available bandwidth decreases? What about the quality of your calls? Are calls dropped? Will the calls be choppy?
Your office is the center of your company. You may be a law firm that does file sharing or a retailer operating a POS system. All of your offices, whether you have 3 or 3, 000, rely on your primary Internet connection to successfully access data. What happens if your circuit goes down? Would you merely be annoyed? Would there be catastrophic consequences? Can your satellite offices perform any work at all? Take new orders? Service existing ones? Circulate necessary data? Make sure you completely understand your needs before you pick a solution. Perhaps you are a software company, running a hosted solution used by hundreds of customers. Perhaps you operate a service where other systems speak with yours via an API to calculate freight rates, commodity prices, collect current weather data or receive any other information that you serve up. What happens when they are unable to connect to your servers? Will your customers remain loyal to you if they have to withstand multiple outages?
Your organization is 100% dependent on the internet to properly function. No calls can go out if your circuits fail. Calls coming in would be unanswerable. You might not even know people are trying to reach your office. You are now, essentially, out of organization. While most reputable call centers are already aware and using redundancy, is it enough? Can you truly rely on your carriers? Are they as dependable as they claim? You should be getting high quality service that ensures your calls are consistently clear and reliable.
You clearly have many options. Your organization needs and budgets will drive your decisions. In summary:
Sometimes redundancy is not essential to you. For example, If you are a small business, with just one office location, a single access to The net circuit may be adequate. You may get by with one 50, 10 or even 5 megabyte circuit. You may find that if your building is “lit”, gigabit service and Metro Ethernet service may be reasonably cost-effective choices for you. Speak with our engineers about what is right for you. Prices vary with location and circuit availability.
You have a midsized company in Ogden; you will surely need higher-speed Internet. You have several choices. Consider the following: Gigabit Internet, Metro Ethernet or higher-speed Internet access circuits. Optimally, multiple carriers and multiple circuits will give you the most redundancy. You can sometimes achieve this without doubling costs. For example, one 100-megabyte circuit may cost more than two smaller 50-megabyte circuits. As a reminder; availability and costs may 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.
What companies have the highest risk for failure; those with multiple sites. They require redundant circuits. Varied providers are optimal. 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 access to The web circuit providers also and make an informed decision. The best mix of providers and services can maximize the productivity and efficiency of your company.
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 must have redundant circuits for multiple providers as well as redundant hardware in your office to ensure your uptime. Spikes or sudden increase in usage can result in Internet slowdowns or disruptions in service. You can decrease the risk of these events 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? Your ideal single circuit or multiple circuits should stay within your budget while still meeting your demands. Choosing the right combination of hardware and circuits can be complicated and confusing.
We have engineers that will analyze your needs, look at your business requirements and develop an action plan for you… for free!Our experts will examine your current usage and demand. We’ll then generate a design that gives you the resources you need while keeping your organization up and running 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.