Because of today’s environment, companies in Wilson, North Carolina rely on the internet. Reliable access to the web is the lifeblood of their organization. The organization functions of all companies, from Fortune 500 to small businesses, depend on fast and reliable Internet access.
We are going to, in the months and years ahead, become more and more reliant on our Internet access.
From email messaging to information sharing, e-commerce to archiving data, and voice over IP to video chat, the net is omnipresent. What is the right solution for your requirements? Is a cable modem sufficient? Is Metro Ethernet necessary? Gigabit Internet may satisfy your needs. A 5 Meg Internet circuit, 10 Meg Internet access, a 50 Meg circuit, or a 100 Meg access to The net point: what is right for your company in Wilson, North Carolina?
The needs of your particular business must be determined before you can select an appropriate service. Why will you need the web? Will you only be web surfing and emailing? Is it used for real-time data connection with cloud servers? Perhaps you, in Wilson, North Carolina, are hosting the data and remote sites rely upon this.
What if you have a disruption in your high-speed Internet? Will your company suffer from the lull? Is your success reliant on uptime? Before you buy anything, you must answer these questions.
In all-encompassing terms, businesses need high-speed access to The web. When choosing the right broadband for company, you need to analyze and balance the costs and benefits. While various providers will throw around terminology 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.
For many, if not all, companies in Wilson, North Carolina, Internet access is needed for at least some employees. It may be needed for organization research, to order office supplies or other reasons.
Perhaps the size of your work force may determine the solution that best fits your needs. A smaller Internet circuit may be enough if you only have a handful of workers. Perhaps a 5 or 10 megabyte is all you need. If you have 50 employees who are using the net simultaneously, you may need more.
Perhaps most workers at your company use an intranet system with limited features. High- speed Internet may not be a priority in this case. When employees are often downloading images, videos and documents, however, the need for speed increases significantly.
Do you perform backups at your company? If you are doing remote backups from every desk, which is advisable, you will need to be able to support simultaneous connections out to the web to synchronize your backup data.
Are you using a service such as DropBox or Google drive to share files? When you save a file it is pushed to the cloud. Then it is synched to the computer or computers of someone else. You must have sufficient bandwidth if you are to successfully support every service including file sharing.
Are you interested in high-speed company Internet? Depending on where you are located, you may want to look into the viability of gigabit Internet and Metro Ethernet. These are typically found in “lit buildings” in Wilson, North Carolina. Carriers have already wired these buildings. You may be surprised by how easy and affordable it is to add high-speed Internet to your business.
While bringing Metro Ethernet to a new building can be an expensive proposition, bringing that connection to a suite within the building is not. You can actually get high-speed access with gigabit Internet or even Metro Ethernet quickly. It often takes only 30 days or less, depending on availability.
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? Is your company retail? Do you have thousands of stores? Do you host the point of sale system for the entire chain? You may be a law firm hosting data for three or four different offices.
When data and programs are hosted centrally at one main site, people outside that location must gain access. Those people are not able to work without a solid Internet connection. Are you picking an intranet solution that provides reliability and stability for your multiple, simultaneous connections from various places?
A cable modem or fairly cheap 10-megabyte circuit may be enough in certain scenarios. For example, these may meet the needs of a single office surfing the web. Company headquarters should have high-speed access to The web such as gigabit Ethernet, Metro Ethernet or some other high-speed dedicated circuit. High speed is important but they also must be able to support multiple distinct connections. A cable modem would probably not be enough.
In many scenarios, bringing in an inexpensive circuit, such as a cable modem, comes at a price. Your low monthly bill may mean that the bandwidth is shared among multiple tenants. 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. You might be capped at 30-megabyte speed, but may never be able to actually reach that speed during the important hours of your organization day. What will the consequences be if you expect 30 but only get half that? What if you get even less?
Other carriers do offer dedicated and guaranteed bandwidth. In this scenario, the bandwidth is fully allocated to you and your company or business. No one else uses it. The full capacity of your circuit should be attainable during all hours regardless of neighboring buildings, people or offices.
Metro Ethernet provides guaranteed bandwidth in increments as follows: 5, 10, 50 and 100 Meg circuits. Gigabit Internet providers offer gigabit speeds from your office to the internet.
Here, carriers deliver enough high-speed to the building, so that it can be split among various tenants. The carrier has the right amount so that everyone gets the contracted speed that has been promised.
Realistically, while some providers in Wilson offer excellent Internet bandwidth products, it is possible for a circuit to go down. In what way can you diminish the risk of an outage?
Try using redundant circuits.
There are, in reality, two kinds of redundancy.
With the first kind, you receive several circuits but they all come from the same 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. Even multiple circuits can fail, such as in the event of a large-scale carrier outage or when there damage to an external line. This offers some protection and assurance but does not eliminate all threats.
The second way to set up circuit redundancy is by using two different providers to bring in your circuits. By using IP address allocations and certain routers, you can bind your connections. By doing this, it appears and behaves as a single circuit. But, you know that they are actually separate and redundant. Diversity redundancy, as this is called, offers you more protection that you might realize. 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 Wilson, North Carolina. In other words, try to obtain circuits entering the building from different sides of the building. Whether they are attached underground or to a telephone pole, your goal should be to have the circuits in different directions leading to different central sites. 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.
Although Internet access comes at a price, the price of unreliable access to The net is tremendous. Consider these scenarios:
If your business utilizes a cable modem, consider whether your carrier is providing circuits for multiple other tenants within the building. During the course of a regular work day, any or all of these other businesses might be performing massive file downloads. Tenants might be taking a large volume of calls or be regularly streaming video. How will less available bandwidth affect your telephone calls? What about the quality of your calls? Will calls be arbitrarily dropped? Will they be full of static?
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 sites, you may have 2, you may have 500, you may have 4, 000, count on your main Internet connection to access and receive data. What happens if your circuit goes down? Is it simply an irritation or a catastrophe? Are remote offices able to work at all? Process new orders? Circulate necessary data? Do you know what your company needs? Be sure to fully understand your requirements. It will help you choose the correct solution. 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 communicate 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 will happen when there is a problem connecting to your servers? How long will your customers tolerate repeated outages?
Your business is entirely Internet based. If your circuits go down, you cannot make calls. Calls coming in would be unanswerable. You might not even know people are trying to reach your office. You are now officially out of company. Even for the most reputable call centers that already know of and use redundancy, is it sufficient? Are your providers sufficiently reliable? Clear and reliable calls are essential. Does your carrier service consistently provide this?
It should be clear by now that you have many different options to select from. Your budget, as well as the needs of your company, will help drive your decisions. Essentially:
If you are a small business, with just one location and not concerned about redundancy, a single five meg, 10 meg or 50 meg Internet access circuit may be adequate. Metro Ethernet service or gigabit service may also be a reasonably priced option if you are in a lit building. Prices will vary. They are based on your location and circuit availability; speak with our engineers to learn your best options.
Having a medium or mid-sized company in Wilson requires that you have higher-speed access to the internet. Your options are Metro Ethernet, gigabit Internet and higher speed circuits. In a perfect world, you will achieve maximum redundancy by utilizing multiple providers to provide and service different circuits. This may be attainable without doubling your costs. For instance, it may be cheaper to utilize two 50 meg circuits in place of one 100 meg circuit. Again, costs vary. Availability also varies. In order to find out the options available for you, in your location, you need to speak with one of our seasoned experts.
Companies with different locations, whether 5 or 50, are at the highest risk. They need redundant circuits. Multiple providers are highly desirable. In addition, consider redundant equipment. Redundant routers and switches can minimize risk also. Have you looked at Metro Ethernet providers, gigabit Internet providers and other high-speed access to The web circuit providers? You should do so before making a decision. The right mix can help. If you can figure out the best combination of carriers and services for your company, you will benefit.
For companies falling in this category, gigabit Internet circuits, Metro Ethernet Internet circuits and point-to-point high-speed Internet circuits are essential. Redundant hardware and redundant circuits will, for these businesses, ensure the greatest uptime. Be sure the circuits are from different providers. You need to provide sufficient bandwidth to handle usage spikes without slowdowns or interruptions. 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? You need to have the right circuit or circuits to meet your demands while staying within your budget. Choosing the right combination of hardware and circuits can be complicated and confusing.
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.
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. Assessments are completed in as little as 48 hours.