The Internet in San Mateo: High-Speed Access

Business Broadband, Gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet: San Mateo High Speed Internet Access

Because of today’s environment, companies in San Mateo, California depend on the web. Reliable access to the net is the lifeblood of their organization. The organization functions of every company, whether it is a small company or on the Fortune 500, from Fortune 500, depends on fast and reliable access to The net.

We are going to, in the months and years ahead, become more and more reliant on our access to The net.

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 web is certainly ubiquitous. What is the best fix for your requirements? Is a cable modem sufficient? Metro Ethernet may be what you need. You may need Gigabit Internet. Will your San Mateo, California business needs be met with a 50 Meg circuit, a 5 Meg circuit, 10 Meg access to The Internet or 100 Meg Internet access point?

Determining your Business Need for Internet Access

Prior to selecting a service, your business must figure out its needs. Will web surfing and email be your primary use of the internet? Is it used for real-time data connection with cloud servers? Are you hosting the data in San Mateo that remote locations rely upon?

What if you have a disruption in your high-speed Internet? How might the downtime cause problems for your business? Is the absence of uptime detrimental? Before you buy anything, you must answer these questions.

Appraising Various High-Speed Internet Solutions in San Mateo

High-speed access to the web is something all companies need. You need to analyze and balance the costs and benefits to your company before choosing the right broadband internet. Don’t be distracted by terminology. While you may hear providers throw out words and phrases like:

• High-speed access to the Internet
• Business Internet or commercial Internet
• We provide broadband cable modems
• Metropolitan-area Ethernet provider
• Gigabit Internet services
• Multiprotocol label switching, also known as MPLS
• point-to-point circuits
• Five megabyte Internet access circuit
• Ten megabyte Internet access provided
• High-speed 50-megabyte access to The web circuits
• Internet access circuits- One hundred megabytes
• Sip trunking providers
• Direct or dedicated Internet access
• … and then some

… be sure not to forget what capability and technical solutions meet your business’s specific needs.

Surfing the Web: Organization Internet Access

At any company in San Mateo some employees, if not all employees, need some type of access to the web if they are to properly perform their job duties. There are countless reasons to need access to the internet. Perhaps it is to order materials, to conduct business research or speak with clients.

The number of workers you employ, may be the most important factor in your decision making process. A five or ten megabyte Internet circuit may be all you need if employ a small workforce. If you have more than that, you may need more.

If your employees are merely accessing an intranet system with limited graphics and video, your need for high-speed Internet may be reduced. When they are frequently downloading things, whether documents, graphics or videos, however, speed is necessary for efficient job performance.

Are you performing routine backups? You may need to support simultaneous connections to the web in order to sync your backup data. If you conduct remote backups from every workstation, which is advisable, this will be important.

Do you use a file sharing service like Google drive or DropBox? When people save a file, it gets pushed to the cloud. The file is then synched with other people’s computers. You must have sufficient bandwidth if you are to successfully support every service including file sharing.

You may consider high-speed company Internet access if you location warrants it. Gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet may be viable options for you. They are commonly found in “lit buildings” in San Mateo, California that have already been wired by a carrier. Choosing to add high-speed Internet to your office is a tough decision but it can be less expensive and easier than you think.

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. Also, securing high-speed Internet access using gigabit Internet or Metro Ethernet often takes less than 30 days, depending on its availability.

Web Applications: They Require High-Speed Internet Access

Does your company host its own servers running websites, APIs or data feeds for other offices or companies outside of your own four walls? Is your main company office with a hosted application accessed by 40 or even 50 branch office sites? Are you a retail chain hosting the POS system for 12, 000 stores? Are you a legal practice hosting the data for three places?

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. 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 places?

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 the headquarters, high-speed access to The net including Metro Ethernet, gigabit Ethernet or other high-speed dedicated circuits is advisable. High speed is important but they also must be able to support multiple distinct connections. Do you think a cable modem is sufficient? It is probably not.

Cable Circuit Sharing in San Mateo, California Versus Dedicated Bandwidth: What is Right For You?

In some situations, there is a high price to pay for bringing in an inexpensive circuit or cable modem. 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. Many cable operators can only deliver a certain amount of bandwidth in a community. That amount of bandwidth must be shared with different buildings and with the tenants housed within. The 30-meg speed you are capped out sounds good but it is possible that you will never reach that speed during business hours. Is getting 7 when you expect 30 a problem?

Guaranteed bandwidth and dedicated bandwidth are solutions that some providers offer. With these, bandwidth belongs to you and your business only; no sharing. Notwithstanding the existence of tenants, offices or buildings in the area, you should have the full capability of your circuits at all times.

Metro Ethernet provides guaranteed bandwidth in increments as follows: 5, 10, 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 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.

High Speed Organization Internet Circuits in San Mateo: How About Redundancy?

You can’t control everything. Even with the superior Internet bandwidth products that some carriers offer in San Mateo, California, problems arise and circuits can fail. Ask this question: “what can I do to decrease the likelihood of an outage?

Redundant circuits.

Redundancy basically comes in two forms.

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. 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. There is some protection that comes with this but there is risk as well.

In the second type of redundancy, you bring in circuits from two different carriers. 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. Diversity redundancy provides greater assurance, comfort and protection. If one carrier has a problem, the other likely will not.

You want maximum redundancy. In order to achieve this, look for redundant circuits from different carriers with different physical geographic pathways in San Mateo. If at all possible, you want to obtain circuits entering the premises on different sides. The circuits would be attached to telephone poles (or underground conduits) in different directions leading to different data centers or central offices. By doing this, if there is a significant problem such as a fire at a data center, you have redundancy in an alternative physical direction.

What Cost Awaits if you do Not Have Enough High-Speed access to The Internet Protection for Your Business?

It is true that access to The net costs you money. However, the cost does not come close to what you will pay if the access that is not reliable. Think about the following situations:

Your office depends 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. What if any or all of those tenants are huge call centers taking in a massive volume of phone calls, are organization that perform large file downloads or stream many videos? As available bandwidth shrinks, what will happen to your calls? How will it affect the quality of that telephone call? Are calls lost or dropped? Perhaps you will sound choppy or will be inaudible.

Is your business the central data location for multiple offices?

Your office is the hub of your company, whether you are a retail organization operating a distributed point of sale (POS) system, an accounting firm sharing databases or a law firm engaged in file sharing. Whether you have 2 locations, 250, or 2000, they all rely on your primary Internet connection to retrieve data and information. How will you be affected if your circuit goes down? Would it cause mere annoyance or utter disaster? Are your other offices able to do any work? Process or take new orders? Circulate essential files and data? It is important that prior to choosing a solution, you understand the true needs and requirements of your particular 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 talk to yours via an API to figure out freight rates, stock prices, to compile weather data or receive any other information that you provide. What if other systems can’t connect to your office servers? Multiple outages may annoy your customers.

The phones in your office, which functions as a call center, relies entirely on voice-over Internet protocol (VoIP)

Is the web integral to the proper function of your organization? Do you count on it entirely? Should your circuits stop working, imagine your people being unable to make any outbound phone calls. No calls could be answered either. Your company is basically done with. Is redundancy enough? Many of the finest call centers with the best reputations already understand and use redundancy. They should consider if they have sufficient protection. Make sure your carriers are as reliable as possible. Do you consistently get quality service that provides clear and reliable calls?

Select the San Mateo, California High-Speed Company Access Circuits Best Suited for Your Company

You clearly have many options. Your company needs and budgets will drive your decisions. Essentially:

Internet Access Needs for Small Organization

If your business is small, with one location or office, you are likely not concerned about redundancy. For you, a single 5, 10 or 50 megabyte Internet access 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. The availability of circuits and your location determine prices; speak with one of our engineers to learn what your best options are.

Internet Access for the Mid-Sized Organization with One Location

Mid-sized businesses in San Mateo, California should be equipped with higher-speed Internet. You may choose between gigabit Internet or Metro Ethernet. You may also look into other higher-speed Internet circuits. In a perfect scenario, multiple circuits from different providers will give you the most redundancy. Achieving this may not be as costly as you first thought. Two 50-megabyte circuits may be more cost effective than a single 100 circuit. Again, costs and availability vary. Speaking with one of our experts will help you determine the options available in your specific location.

Mid-Sized Company with More than One Location: Access to the Internet

Companies with different places, whether 5 or 50, are at the highest risk. They need redundant circuits. Different providers are desirable. Additionally, you should consider redundant equipment (routers and switches) in your facility to minimize the risk of downtime. Before you make a decision here too, do your research. Look closely into Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers, gigabit Internet providers and other high-speed circuit providers. The right combination of services and providers can positively impact the efficiency of your company.

Clients who provide services delivered via Internet, large corporate and enterprise clientele

Companies such as these require the following: Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and point-to-point (PPP) high-speed Internet circuits. You will want to have the greatest protection of your uptime. To accomplish this you must have redundancy: redundant circuits from multiple carriers and redundant hardware for your system. You must have the bandwidth to withstand sharp increases in usage. Doing so will help protect you from slowdowns or interruptions. Your goal is to have hardware and circuits that are more than capable of providing support to a significant number of fast and simultaneous connections.

Free Internet Demand and Need Analysis

The danger and risk of failing circuits is tremendous. So is the risk of having less bandwidth than you need. The circuit or circuits you have must stay within the parameters of your budget while still meeting your organization needs. It is vital to choose the correct mix of hardware and circuits. Figuring out exactly what to put in the mix, can be a daunting task.

Our engineers will take the pressure off and develop a free action plan for you by analyzing your needs. We will 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 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. Assessments are done in as few as two days or within 48 hours.