In today’s environment, companies in Tempe, Arizona count on reliable access to The net as the lifeblood of their organization. All companies, big and small, need fast and reliable access to The web.
Internet access will become increasingly crucial to us in the coming months and years. Our dependence on access to The net will only grow as time goes on.
The net is ubiquitous. From email to data sharing, archiving to commerce and VOIP to video conferencing, the web is everywhere. What is the best fix for your requirements? Can a cable modem suffice? Metro Ethernet may be what you need. Would Gigabit Internet suffice? What does your Tempe organization need? Does it require 10 Meg access to The web, a 100 Meg Internet access point, a 50 Meg circuit or a 5 Meg circuit?
The needs of your particular business must be determined before you can select an appropriate service. Is the net only used for web surfing and email? Is it used for real-time data connection with cloud servers? Perhaps you, in Tempe, are hosting the data and remote locations rely upon this.
What if there is an outage and your high-speed Internet is interrupted? How might the downtime cause problems for your company? How much uptime is essential to your business? You must answer these questions before you buy.
In the broadest of terms, companies need high-speed Internet access. When picking the correct broadband internet, balancing the costs and benefits to your business is imperative. You will hear service providers use terms like:
… do not stray from the real issues. Focus on what your company’s needs are and what capabilities and technical solutions will help satisfy them.
At any company in Tempe, Arizona some employees, if not all employees, need some type of access to the web if they are to properly perform their job duties. The net is required for so many things, whether to order items, look up business information communicate with third parties.
The best solution may rely upon how many employees you have. A five or ten megabyte Internet circuit may be all you need if employ a small workforce. You may need more if you have more workers and those workers all need to be on the net during the same hours.
If your employees are merely accessing an intranet system with limited graphics and video, your need for high-speed Internet may be reduced. However, employees who must often download documents, images and videos, need that speed.
Do you routinely backup? 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.
Are you using Google drive, DropBox or another file sharing service? As people save files, those files are pushed to the cloud and then synchronized back to other people’s computers. Supporting file sharing, while supporting every other service, requires sufficient bandwidth.
Business high-speed access to The net may interest you. Depending on your location, you may have options such as gigabit Internet or Metro Ethernet. These are typically found in “lit buildings” in Tempe, Arizona. Providers have already wired these buildings. You may be surprised by how easy and affordable it is to add high-speed Internet to your organization.
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. Did you know that obtaining high-speed Internet access with Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet can often take 30 days or less? Of course, this depends upon availability.
Do you have your own business servers that run APIs, websites or feeds for offsite offices or companies? Do fifty or so branch offices need access to a hosted application at your company headquarters? Are you a retail chain hosting the POS system for 12, 000 stores? Are you a law firm hosting data for multiple office sites?
If your company hosts its programs and information at a central location, people outside of that location need to have access in order to conduct company. Those people are not able to work without a solid Internet connection. Make sure that when you choose your intranet solution it is reliable enough to support your need for multiple and simultaneous connections for many different places.
For a single office surfing the web, a cable modem or inexpensive 10 Meg circuit may be adequate. It is advisable that high-speed access to The Internet be available at the central business office or headquarters, including gigabit Ethernet, Metro Ethernet or some other high-speed dedicated circuits. All offer quick speed but they must also be able to support diverse and multiple connections. Do you think a cable modem is sufficient? It is probably not.
In some situations, there is a high price to pay for bringing in an inexpensive circuit or cable modem. 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. It is possible that you have a cable modem with a 30 Meg connection but cannot reach proper speeds during peak hours. Cable operators differ but many have prescribed limits on the bandwidth amount that they can deliver within a set community. The bandwidth branches off to the multiple buildings, offices and tenants within them. The 30-meg speed you are capped out sounds good but it is possible that you will never reach that speed during company hours. Is getting 7 when you expect 30 a problem?
Some providers are available who offer dedicated bandwidth and 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.
As an example, look at Metro Ethernet. They provide guaranteed bandwidth in various increments. You can receive guaranteed bandwidth in increments of 100, 50, 10 and 5 megabytes. If you want to reach gigabit speeds from your organization out to the web, you can by using a gigabit Internet provider.
Carriers 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.
You can’t control everything. Even with the superior Internet bandwidth products that some providers offer in Tempe, problems arise and circuits can fail. What can you do to minimize the chance that you will experience an outage of some kind?
The answer is redundant circuits.
Redundancy basically comes in two forms.
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.
The other type of redundancy requires you to utilize circuits from different carriers. These connections can be bound together so they act and appear to the public as a single circuit. Using particular routers and IP address allocations, no one would be able to tell that you have multiple providers or circuits. Truthfully, they are entirely separate. They are redundant and exist in case one of them fails. You will get more substantial protection from this diversity redundancy. If one carrier has a widespread issue, you have a carrier that will still be alive.
To maximize the benefit of redundancy, consider looking for redundant circuits from different carriers that have different pathway in Tempe. Alternatively stated, try to have your circuits enter the building on different sides from one another. The circuits would attached to the proper outside source whether a subterranean conduit or a telephone pole. They would be set up in different directions and would lead to different data centers or main office spaces. 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.
The cost of dependable access to The net pales in comparison to the cost of unreliable access. Please think about the following scenarios:
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 business that perform large file downloads or stream many videos? What will happen to your telephone calls as the amount of usable bandwidth decreases? What happens to the quality of that phone call? Are calls lost or dropped? Will the calls be choppy?
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. Your primary Internet connection is responsible for granting access to data to all of your locations. This is true whether you have 3 sites or 2000 places. How will you be affected if your circuit goes down? Would it cause mere annoyance or utter disaster? Are remote offices able to work at all? Process new orders? Disseminate needed information and data? Make sure you completely understand your needs before you pick a solution. You have a software company, and are running a hosted solution for dozens, maybe hundreds, of customers. Maybe you operate a service that allows other systems to speak with yours via API. This may be to collect miscellaneous data, calculate prices or shipping rates or other information. What happens when they are unable to connect to your servers? If you have repeated outages, how long will they remain a customer?
Does your business completely rely on the net? If your circuits go down, you cannot make calls. No calls could be answered either. You are now, essentially, out of organization. Even for the most reputable call centers that already know of and use redundancy, is it sufficient? Make sure your providers are as reliable as possible. Is the quality of service sufficient? Are your calls clear and reliable?
You clearly have many options. Your budget, as well as the needs of your company, will help drive your decisions. In review:
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 net circuit may be adequate. You may find that if your building is “lit”, gigabit service and Metro Ethernet service may be reasonably cost-effective choices for you. Prices vary based on your location and availability of circuits; speak with our engineers to find your best option.
You will need higher speed Internet access if you have a medium sized organization in Tempe. Gigabit Internet, Metro Ethernet and other higher speed Internet circuits are options to consider. Multiple circuits utilizing multiple providers would, ideally, provide you with maximum redundancy. You may be able to achieve this in a manner that will not break the bank. For example, one 100-megabyte circuit may cost more than two smaller 50-megabyte circuits. Do not forget that you will find variations in price and availability. Speaking with one of our experts will help you determine the options available in your specific location.
The greatest risk of failure belongs to companies that have multiple places of business or offices. They need 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. Take a careful look at Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers and gigabit Internet providers. Research other high-speed access to The Internet circuit providers also and make an informed decision. Finding the best combination of services, providers and equipment can go a long way toward helping your organization run as efficiently as possible.
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 essential to ensuring uptime. You must have the bandwidth to withstand sharp increases in usage. Doing so will help protect you from slowdowns or interruptions. Be sure to have the right circuits and hardware. They both must be able to support multiple, fast, concurrent connections.
Do not risk having failing circuits or not enough bandwidth. The right circuits must meet your demand while keeping you within your budget. 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 look at your current usage, demand levels and scope out a design to give you the resources you need while keeping your organization up and running at a reasonable cost.
Please complete the contact form by clicking here. You may also call our office to set up an appointment for your assessment. Assessments are done in as few as two days or within 48 hours.