In today’s world, Virginia Beach companies need dependable Internet access. It is the lifeblood of their company. Fortune 500 companies to small companies and everything in between, count on reliable and fast access to The web.
Our reliance on access to the internet will become greater in the near and distant future.
Our uses of the internet reach far and wide. From data sharing, video calls, and shopping to VOIP and email, the web has a broad presence. What do you need? Is a cable modem enough? Metro Ethernet may be what you need. Gigabit Internet may satisfy your needs. A 5 Meg Internet circuit, 10 Meg Internet access, a 50 Meg circuit, or a 100 Meg Internet access point: what is right for your company in Virginia Beach?
The needs of your particular business must be determined before you can select an appropriate service. Are surfing the web and sending email the only uses of the web? Is it used to network with cloud servers? Perhaps you, in Virginia Beach, are hosting the data and remote places rely on this.
What if your high-speed Internet is disrupted by an outage? What will happen to your organization? Will your company suffer from the lull? Is the absence of uptime detrimental? Prior to making any purchases, you must determine the answers to these questions.
Speaking broadly, all companies need high-speed access to the net. An analysis of the costs and benefits should be done prior to choosing the broadband internet that is correct for your organization. Many service providers toss out terms such as:
… focus on what matters: what does your company need and what are the best services and solutions out there to meet those needs?
Workers for most companies in Virginia Beach, Virginia have some need to access the web during the course of their job. Internet access may be needed to conduct research, use third-party applications or to order supplies.
The number of employees you have may determine your best solution. A five or ten megabyte Internet circuit may be all you need if employ a small workforce. If you have a larger workforce, you may want to consider more. This is especially true if they all need to use the internet simultaneously.
You may not need as much high-speed Internet access 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.
Are you performing backups? Simultaneous connections to the web, which you need in order to sync your backup data, require support. If you conduct remote backups from every workstation, which you definitely should, this will be important.
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? This is how a file sharing service works: You save a file. Then the file is pushed to the cloud, and is then synchronized with other people’s computers. 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. “Lit buildings” that have already been wired by a carrier, are commonly the site for these. It may be shock you to know that installing high-speed Internet access may not be particularly expensive or inconvenient.
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 Internet access with Metro Ethernet or gigabit Internet in 30 days or less.
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? 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? Do you run a law office that hosts the data for satellite offices in different cities or states?
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 organization. People can’t work if you have no Internet connection. Is the intranet solution you are choosing sufficiently reliable? Is it stable enough to support simultaneous connections from different sites?
The needs of an office with one employee web surfing may not need more than a cable modem or an inexpensive 5-10 megabyte circuit. For the headquarters, high-speed Internet access 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. A cable modem would probably not be enough.
There is a price that comes along with choosing a cable modem or other lower cost circuit. 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 companies only deliver a set amount of bandwidth within a community. That amount of bandwidth must be shared with different buildings and with the tenants housed within. While you may be capped at a 30 Meg speed, you may never be able to 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?
You can sign up for dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth from some providers. With these, bandwidth belongs to you and your company only; no sharing. The full capacity of your circuit should be attainable during all hours regardless of neighboring buildings, people or offices.
For example, Metro Ethernet guarantees bandwidth in 5 met circuits, 10 Meg circuits, 50 and 100 Meg circuits. Gigabit Internet providers offer gigabit speeds from your office to the internet.
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.
Circuits can go down in Virginia Beach even though certain providers offer superior Internet bandwidth products. You must ask yourself: “how do I lessen the chance of an outage? ”
The answer is redundant circuits.
Redundancy basically comes in two forms.
The first is where you get multiple circuits from one carrier. If there is a problem with a line or a port in your router, circuit redundancy can offer some protection. If that carrier has a wide reaching outage or there is a line broken or damaged outside of your building, both circuits may go down. 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 carriers to bring in your circuits. If you think it is beneficial, you can bind the connections together in a manner that makes your circuits act and look like a single source. Truthfully, they are entirely separate. They are redundant and exist in case one of them fails. Diversity redundancy provides greater assurance, comfort and protection. When one carrier has a problem like an outage or some other failure, you have another one that works.
To maximize the benefit of redundancy, consider looking for redundant circuits from different carriers that have different pathway in Virginia Beach. Alternatively stated, try to have your circuits enter the building on different sides from one another. The circuits would be established either underground or on telephone poles and would be set up in different directions and lead to different offices. This way, if there is a major catastrophe, such as a fire at a data center or a major accident impacting circuits within a region, you have redundancy in a different physical direction.
While Internet access is not free, it pales in comparison with the cost of not having reliable Internet access. Please consider these situations:
You are on a cable modem with the carrier providing circuits to 14 other tenants in your building. During your working day, those tenants could be conducting massive downloads of information, processing a large amount of calls or streaming endless video. How will less available bandwidth affect your telephone calls? What happens to the quality of that phone call? Will calls be cut-off? Perhaps you will sound choppy or will be inaudible.
Your office is the center of your organization. You may be a law firm that does file sharing or a retailer operating a POS system. Your primary Internet connection is responsible for granting access to data to all of your locations. This is true whether you have 3 places or 2000 sites. If your circuit goes done, what happens next? Is it simply an irritation or a catastrophe? Are remote offices able to work at all? Process new orders? Disseminate needed information and data? It is important that prior to choosing a solution, you understand the true needs and requirements of your particular organization. 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. 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 happens when they are unable to connect to your servers? How will repeated outages affect your customers? Will they remain customers?
What if your organization could not function at all without the net? Maybe your organization relies on it completely. No outbound calls can be made should your circuits go down. Calls coming in would be unanswerable. You might not even know people are trying to reach your office. Looks like you are now out of business. Even for the most reputable call centers that already know of and use redundancy, is it sufficient? Are your current carriers as dependable as you would like? You should be getting high quality service that ensures your calls are consistently clear and reliable.
You clearly have many options. Your budget, as well as the needs of your company, will help drive your decisions. In summary:
If you have one location or office and do not feel the need to consider redundancy for your system, a smaller access to The web circuit may be all you need. A single fifty, ten or five megabyte circuit might be enough. Gigabit service and Metro Ethernet options seem expensive. If you are in a lit building, however, they can be less than you think. Look into it. Prices will vary. They are based on your location and circuit availability; speak with our engineers to learn your best options.
If you have a midsized organization in Virginia Beach, you will need higher-speed access to The web. Gigabit Internet, Metro Ethernet and other higher speed Internet circuits are options to consider. Using different circuits and different carriers will, if you choose, provide you with redundancy. You can sometimes achieve this without doubling costs. Two smaller circuits may be cheaper than one. For instance, you may use two 50 meg circuits instead of a single 100 meg circuit. Availability and costs vary. You need to speak with one of our experts to determine your options in your specific location.
Companies with multiple locations are most at risk for failure. Redundant circuits must be an essential part of their systems. Multiple providers are highly desirable. Also, redundant equipment such as switches and routers in your facility can minimize the risk of downtime. Here too, take a careful look and choose the right Ethernet access services, Metro Ethernet providers, gigabit Internet providers and other high-speed access to The web circuit providers. Your business can benefit from finding the right mix of services and providers.
For companies falling in this category, gigabit Internet circuits, Metro Ethernet Internet circuits and point-to-point high-speed Internet circuits are essential. Having redundant hardware as well as redundant circuits from different providers will ensure your needed uptime. You do not want any slowdowns or interruptions that often occur during spikes in usage. Avoid this by having sufficient bandwidth. Your circuits and hardware must be able to support a large number of fast and simultaneous connections.
The risk of insufficient bandwidth or failing circuits is tremendous. Your demand and budget constraints should both be considered when you decide what circuit or combination of circuits you must have. Selecting the appropriate mix of circuits and hardware can overwhelm you.
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. 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.
An appointment for an assessment can be made by calling our office or clicking here to complete the contact form on the side of this page. It can take as little as 48 hours to provide a complete assessment.