Tacoma High-Speed Internet Access

Tacoma, Washington High Speed Access to The Internet: Metro Ethernet Access, Gigabit Internet and Organization Broadband Internet

In today’s world, Tacoma, Washington companies need dependable access to The web. It is the lifeblood of their organization. The company functions of every company, whether it is a small business or on the Fortune 500, from Fortune 500, depends on fast and reliable Internet access.

Our reliance on access to the net will become greater in the near and distant future.

The web is ubiquitous. From email to data sharing, archiving to commerce and VOIP to video conferencing, the net is everywhere. What is the right solution to meet your needs? Will a cable modem be adequate? Do you need Metro Ethernet? Is Gigabit Internet right for you? What is best for your business in Tacoma, Washington? Will your organization needs be met with a 50 Meg circuit, a 5 Meg circuit, 10 Meg access to The web or 100 Meg Internet access point?

How to Define your Company Need for Internet Access

Prior to selecting a service, your organization must figure out its needs. Is the internet only used for web surfing and email? Is real time data connection with cloud servers important to your business? Do remote sites depend on you hosting the data in Tacoma?

What happens to your organization if your high-speed Internet experiences an outage? Can your company afford the downtime? How much uptime is essential to your organization? You must answer these questions before you buy.

Appraising Various High-Speed Internet Solutions in Tacoma

High-speed access to the internet is something all companies need. Deciding on the right broadband is not easy. It requires a thorough cost-benefit analysis. While various providers will throw around terminology like:

• Fast Internet access is for you!
• Corporate Internet
• Provider of broadband cable modems
• Metro Ethernet experts
• Provider of Gigabit Internet service
• MPLS network
• PPP- or point-to-point protocol
• Five megabyte Internet access
• Ten megabyte Internet access
• High-speed 50-megabyte Internet access circuits
• One hundred Meg access to The web circuits provided
• We provide sip trunks
• Dedicated or “specific” Internet access
• … and more

… focus on what matters: what does your company need and what are the best services and solutions out there to meet those needs?

Web Surfing and Company Internet Access

At any company in Tacoma, Washington some employees, if not all employees, need some type of access to the web if they are to properly perform their job duties. Third party applications, organization research or development and e-commerce are just a few of the ways the web may be needed.

Your best course of action may be determined by the size of your work force. A five or ten megabyte Internet circuit may be all you need if employ a small workforce. 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.

Do you backup information? When you do remote backups from every workstation, which you should, you must support multiple and simultaneous connections to the web in order to sync your backup data.

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? 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.

Are you interested in high-speed business Internet? Depending on where you are located, you may want to look into the viability of gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet. These can usually be found in Tacoma, Washington in “lit buildings” that have already been wired. It may be shock you to know that installing high-speed Internet access may not be particularly expensive or inconvenient.

While bringing Metro Ethernet to a new building can be an expensive proposition, bringing that connection to a suite within the building is not. Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet may provide you with high-speed access to The net in thirty days or less, depending on availability.

High-Speed access to The web Required for Hosting Applications

Does your company host its own servers? Does your company use the hosted servers to run data feeds, APIs or websites for offices or businesses located elsewhere? 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 a legal practice hosting the data for three places?

Access to data and programs by people outside of your main location becomes necessary when you host information centrally. If the web connection is interrupted or fails, those people are unable to accomplish any work. Are you choosing an intranet solution that is sufficiently reliable and stable to support multiple simultaneous connections from varied locations?

For one office or a small organization with just one or two people surfing the web, a less expensive 10 Meg circuit or a cable modem may meet your needs. Metro Ethernet, gigabit Ethernet or other high-speed dedicated circuits is advisable for the headquarters where high-speed Internet access is important. Multiple diverse connections require support, in addition to high speed. A cable modem would probably not be enough.

Cable Circuit Sharing in Tacoma Versus Dedicated Bandwidth: What is Right For You?

In many cases, installing an inexpensive cable modem comes at a price. Oftentimes, a lower monthly rate comes with the realization that you are sharing bandwidth with many different tenants and offices. 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 operators are only permitted to establish a certain amount of bandwidth within communities. That amount of bandwidth must be shared with different buildings and with the tenants housed within. While you may be capped at thirty-megabyte speed, will you ever reach that speed during business hours? What will the consequences be if you expect 30 but only get half that? What if you get even less?

Some providers offer customers dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth. If you want your very own bandwidth that is not used by anyone else, you should consider this. No matter who is in the building or what buildings surround you, you should always run at full speed.

You can receive guaranteed bandwidth with Metro Ethernet. You can receive it in increments of five, 10, 50 or one hundred megabyte circuits. Gigabit speeds from your office to the net 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.

Incorporating Redundancy Into Your High Speed Company Internet Circuits in Tacoma, Washington

Despite outstanding Internet bandwidth products offered by providers in Tacoma, Washington, circuits do go down. What can you do to minimize the chance that you will experience an outage of some kind?

Circuits that are redundant may be a good idea.

Essentially, there are two different ways to look at redundancy.

The first is where you get multiple circuits from one carrier. This provides some protection when there are certain failures. Multiple circuits can help for example, when there is a physical line issue or a problem with a router port. 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 offering some protection, it is not without risk.

Utilizing circuits from two different providers is the second kind of redundancy. 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. In reality, they are completely separate and redundant to each other. This is called diversity redundancy and offers more protection that the first. In the event that one carrier goes down, the other will still be alive.

When considering redundant circuits and providers, try to be sure that the carriers you look at in Tacoma, Washington have different physical geographic routes or pathways. Doing so will maximize 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. In this way you have redundancy in different physical directions. If there is an event that causes a regional circuit problem, you have an alternative that is unaffected.

Not Having Business Class High Speed-Internet Access Protection May Cost You

It is true that access to The Internet costs you money. However, the cost does not come close to what you will pay if the access that is not reliable. Contemplate these situations:

Your organization relies on VoIP for its telephone service

Your office uses a cable modem and, in addition to you, the carrier provides 10-15 additional tenants with 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 the amount of available bandwidth diminishes, what happens to your phone calls? What about phone call quality? Are calls lost or dropped? Will the calls be choppy?

Your organization is the central data point for multiple locations

You may be an accounting firm that shares databases, a retail chain company utilizing a point of sale system or a law practice sharing files. Regardless of the specifics, your office is the hub for your enterprise. Whether you have 2 places, 250, or 2000, they all count on your primary Internet connection to retrieve data and information. What happens if your circuit goes down? Is it simply an irritation or a catastrophe? Are remote offices able to work at all? Take new orders? Service existing ones? Share essential information with anyone? Before choosing a solution, be sure to assess and really understand what your business requires. Maybe you are a corporation that designs and sells software and you run a hosted solution that is used by hundreds and hundreds of customers. You may operate a service like this: other systems speak with 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 these other systems have difficulty connecting your servers? Multiple outages may annoy your customers.

You have a large call center that is completely reliant on voice over Internet protocol

What if your business could not function at all without the net? Maybe your company relies on it completely. If your circuits go down, you cannot make calls. In addition, they will be unable to answer incoming calls. You are essentially out of company. While most reputable call centers are already aware and using redundancy, is it enough? Are your current carriers as dependable as you would like? Is the quality of service sufficient? Are your calls clear and reliable?

Picking the Right High-Speed Organization Access Circuits for Your Tacoma, Washington Company

You have no shortage of options. Your company needs and your budget will have to come into consideration when deciding on your solutions. Essentially:

Internet Access for the Small Company Owner

Sometimes redundancy is not essential to you. For example, If you are a small company, with just one office location, a single access to The web circuit may be sufficient. You may get by with one 50, 10 or even 5 megabyte circuit. For an office in a lit building, you may find that gigabit service or Metro Ethernet are affordable options for you. Prices will vary. They are based on your location and circuit availability; speak with our engineers to learn your best options.

Internet Access-One Location- Medium Sized Business

Having a medium or mid-sized company in Tacoma requires that you have higher-speed access to the net. Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and other higher-speed Internet circuits are your options. Ideally, you want to have the greatest redundancy. You can achieve this by using multiple circuits from different providers. Achieving this may not be as costly as you first thought. For instance, it may be cheaper to utilize two 50 meg circuits in place of one 100 meg circuit. Availability and costs vary. You need to speak with one of our experts to determine your options in your specific location.

Mid-Sized Businesses Internet access – Multiple Locations

Businesses with many locations face the greatest risk for failure. They need redundant circuits. Multiple providers or carriers are recommended. You can minimize the risk of downtime at if you also have redundant equipment like routers or switches. Take a careful look at Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers and gigabit Internet providers. Research other high-speed access to The net circuit providers also and make an informed decision. Your business can benefit from finding the right mix of services and providers.

Providers of services that rely on the internet for their delivery, big corporate clients and enterprise customers

Companies such as these require the following: Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and point-to-point (PPP) high-speed Internet circuits. You absolutely need redundant circuits from different providers as well as redundant hardware. This is important to ensuring uptime. You must have the bandwidth to withstand sharp increases in usage. Doing so will help protect you from slowdowns or interruptions. Both your hardware and circuits must be capable of supporting a vast number of simultaneous and fast connections.

You May Receive an Internet Need and Internet Demand Analysis for Free

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. You have to select the optimal combination of hardware and circuits, which is a daunting task.

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 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 if you wish to complete the contact form on the side of this page. Alternatively, call our office to schedule an assessment. Assessments are completed in as little as 48 hours.