Sunday, August 30, 2015

Will VoIP Work Over VPN?



Remote workers working from the comfort of their home will likely use VPN or virtual private network to gain access to business resources. Since the company will not like any of their data to leak on to the internet and be broadcasted for all to see, it becomes essential for remote workers to use a secure internet connection.
The secure internet connection uses protocols to conceal information prior to sending it. Even though it is essential to protect the data being sent, it is not as important to provide the same amount of security to VoIP connection via a VPN connection.

Why Do Remote Workers Need to Utilize VoiP Connections via VPN Connections?

The remote workers uses their home office as a place to access the company’s website and any given resources they provide them. In doing so, their home turns into an extension of the company’s LAN. In order to limit NAT problems, they need to use VoIP over VPN, which means it will work.
For instance, remote workers connect to a hosted VoIP service, their VPN meant to connect to their office will not tunnel voice. Instead, it will connect directly through the router of their home to the VoISP over their internet connection. To make voice calls using VoIP over VPN improves voice quality needed to make a call to the office or to a client.

How Voice Quality Improves?

Traffic for VoIP improves voice quality because it uses UDP to decrease latency while TCP works to ensure that all the packets arrive at their destination in order. However, one holdup in the delivery can cause the entire stream to stall. In the event of a delay in the packets getting to their destination, you need to burst bandwidth to assist the package find its way to the destination.
To assist it in its journey to the correct destination, it will detect the fault, and then retransmit the data to fill the hole. This in return will improve voice quality, meaning it is a good idea to provide remote workers with VoIP over VPN.
It may increase the voice quality by 500 kbps, assuming you have a good network. VoIP over VPN will do more than increase voice quality, but it will encrypt the call, which several VoIP protocol have failed to do. Another benefit is that if you have sufficient amounts of burst bandwidth, you can easily have about twelve remote users.
Out of the 2 Mbps pipe, they will be consuming below 1 Mbps, leaving you with an extra 1 Mbps burst capability to use in case any packets become lost on their way. If the remote workers spend their time researching on the internet, transferring files, and more, the numbers will need to be adjusted.
If you have remote workers working from their home or any other destination, you should incorporate VoIP over VPN to improve voice quality. This will be the best move you would make in a long time.

Friday, August 28, 2015

HealthCare Providers Need Reliable Internet



Do healthcare providers need reliable internet? What do you think the answer to this question should be? You will instantly answer yes or nod your head in agreement at the question, as you know the evolution of the technology and the internet has opened new doors for doctors and nurses. Healthcare providers have found a whole new way to take care of their patients from far away.
In fact, you do not have to be even in the same country for your doctor to reach out to you and advice on an existing medical illness, as now; they can do it through video conferencing technology such as Skype or Viber.
Most healthcare providers have already transitioned into this new age thinking of keeping track of a patient’s health from a distance and at times, even directly from the hospital. To comprehend the need for healthcare providers to use the internet, let us look at some of the reasons having a reliable internet is important:

1.     For Communication

Healthcare professionals cannot go a day without the internet, as it would put their whole operation into jeopardy. If the internet malfunctions or slows down, communication lines between a nurse and a doctor and a patient and a doctor will be hindered. Imagine patients trying to reach a doctor via the internet from another country, but not getting any response.
What about the nurse not being able to bring up the patient’s medical history because the network is down, it would create a lot of trouble. As a result, they might even lose their patients.

2.     For Decreasing Device Downtime

If a hospital device malfunctions, it will be sent to a technician. Getting the problem fixed will take a long time, not if the healthcare provider has reliable internet. Instead of sending it to the technician, the technician might be able to run diagnostics on the device sitting at the office. If it is a minor problem, they will instruct the technicians working at the healthcare facility to repair it.

3.     For Replenishing Medical Supplies

Instead of calling up the technician to ship you fluids for the device, he/she will sent it to you in advance. The technician will be able to monitor the device from their place of work. This will help hospital providers in a great way, as it will decrease the hassle of scheduling the patient to come another day, as the device is temporarily shut down.

4.     For Maintaining the Medical Devices

A problem that arises in the circles of healthcare providers is managing the medical devices effectively. The machines need to be given their complete attention, but since the information is gathered manually, the healthcare providers are not capable of tracking every device. They can make it easier on themselves by letting an internet application meant to keep track of all the devices manage them. The devices will tell them when a machine is low of some liquids, when they should contact a technician, and what item in the inventory is running out.
In order to carry out all of these activities efficiently, healthcare providers need a reliable internet, which we promise to give them.

Wednesday, August 26, 2015

How Dynamic Bandwidth Management Improves Productivity



When a company begins to suspect a loss of productivity in their workforce, they need to mull over the cause. The people in charge of running the business need to put their heads together with the managers and network administers to inquire about the reason they are suffering from a lack of productivity. They need to ask themselves the following questions:
·         Are they suffering from incessant network outages during the week? If yes, how often do they happen and how long is the duration of them?
·         Is the internet backed up with traffic coming from useless applications, not important to the company’s functions?
·         Are their employees using their privileges of the internet for the wrong purposes?
·         Is the internet being dreadfully slow that it is taking people forever to perform a simple task? If yes, determine the cause.
Answer the aforementioned questions as best as you can, as you need to know the reason your employees are not able to increase their productivity. Once you have determined the cause, which can be more than one, you need think about installing the dynamic bandwidth management system to boost your company’s productivity levels.

How Will the Dynamic Bandwidth Management System Help Your Company Thrive?

If your company is unable to perform optimally and the reason is low productivity levels, you need to root out the cause for it. Even if your company’s productivity levels are on par with other companies, you still need to get the dynamic bandwidth management system. Why, you may wonder?
Companies with already commendable productivity levels should get the dynamic bandwidth management system because it will skyrocket their productivity to even higher levels. Companies with not so commendable productivity levels should without no doubt get the dynamic bandwidth management system. Let’s look at how it can help your company:
1.      Do you have speed issues? Is your network slow like a turtle? No worries, with dynamic bandwidth management system your system will be running as fast as the cheetah.
2.      Is the application you want to use to perform your work not working well? With dynamic bandwidth management system, the network administrator will be able to allocate the right amount of speed to make it work.
3.      Are your employees using up all the bandwidth, but for all the wrong purposes? If you answered with a yes, the key is to limit their bandwidth usage by managing it. Oh, and if anyone tries to do anything else other than work, you will know, as you will be able to monitor their internet activities.
4.      Are your critical applications in danger and not working properly? The dynamic bandwidth management system will sift through paths, adjusting as it does, and use responsive routes to ensure the site or applications keep functioning, even through a network outage.
5.      Are your employees talking more during work hours than actually working? You will be able to make a policy stating internet usage on a monthly, weekly, daily, and hourly basis. You will know if they are working or not, as you will have the reports of their performance in front of you.
If you want all the benefits associated with the dynamic bandwidth management system, you need to contact us now!

Monday, August 24, 2015

How Much Downtime Can Your Business Take?



Can your business survive without internet access?—Yes or No? Most businesses will become frantic when they realize a network outage is taking far too long, even for their experts, to fix. Hence, most will answer the question with a no that they cannot maintain business-related functions without any internet access. In this day and age, having a functional and up and running network has become an increasingly important tool for businesses.
Without it, they will not be able to carry on their daily tasks or for that matter, complete them in a timely manner. What’s more is that they will lose revenue with each network outage that occurs.

What Should You Do as a Business?

One thing is for sure is that you do not sit on your chairs with a frown on your face and worry wrinkles on your forehead. As a business and as the head of a business to be precise, you need to take action to understand how much network downtime your business can really afford. If your business is exceeding the data your network administrators have come up with, you have a failure on your hands.
Your business will not do as well as its competition. Well, that one was a given. Your business will lose profits, productivity, and perhaps, employees frustrated at the way you have chosen to handle this problem. If you do not want any of the predictions just mentioned to come true, you need to incorporate a bandwidth network system that will enable your network to keep performing exceptionally.
A bandwidth network system that will minimize network outages, making sure your business does not have a repeat of all those dark days with no working internet. If you do not act upon this problem now, you will join in the leagues of businesses that suffer several network outages a year.

Why You Do Not Want to Join the League?

Collectively, it has been estimated that network downtime causes businesses to lose $26.5 billion in revenue, which informs us that each business has lost about $150,000 in revenue. In fact, 56% of businesses in North America have failed to implement a network system that allows them to decrease the occurrence of network outages.
You need to shun the league of businesses that have taken no action to improving the way their business functions on a daily basis, but join the league of smart businesses that have recognized the benefits of a network bandwidth system. Another astounding fact is the impression the business leaves on their employees and staff.

Why a Business with No Action Plan Receives a Bad Rep

To put to you simply, no one wants to work for a business that suffers from constant network outages. It is annoying, frustrating, and can drive you over the edge.
On average, a business suffers from fourteen hours of downtime each year. We hope you are not one of them. If you are, do something about it by integrating a network bandwidth system that does not stop work in the middle of the day.




Saturday, August 22, 2015

How to Achieve Geographic Server Failover



An automatic geographic sever failover is utilized by companies to ensure they remain online in the event of a natural disaster. If it detects an error on the primary server, it will direct the incoming traffic to another server. The automatic geographic server failover will allow the company to increase productivity even if the error was manmade.
By achieving geographic server failover, all your critical data from applications will be saved, as the recovery time will be quick and network downtime will occur less frequently. You can achieve geographic server failover by doing taking the following steps:

1.     Establish a Secondary Failover Server

The first thing on the agenda should be getting a secondary failover server. Select a server that does not look anything like your primary server. This means using a different host for the second server, and make sure the location of your second server is also different. Conduct some detailed research on the second failover servers you narrow down to use, as using the wrong one can put your company in jeopardy.

2.     Synchronize the Geographic Server with Your Primary Server

Remember your geographic server is your secondary server. You need to ask someone who is an expert at synchronizing the two servers together, preferably a network administrator. You want the same information to be on the second server as it is on the first sever. In order to make the happen, you need to synchronize the two server together. The two things that you need to synchronize are website files and databases.

3.     Tool to Switch Your Servers

If one server is not working properly, you need a tool to switch it to the next server. The tool will check the status of the server every few minutes to attain a certain response. If it fails to get the response it is looking for, it will switch to the geographic server.

4.     Establish DNS Failover

The function of the DNS Failover is to check the status script of the server, which it will do every few minutes. If you or others cannot reach your website for instance through your primary server, the DNS Failover will get to work. It will switch the entries to look like the primary server, and no one will notice a difference. When your primary server is back up, it will direct traffic back to it.

5.     Test the Geographic Server

Wait two days before you test your newly created geographic server, as it might take approximately 24 to 28 hours for the DN transfer to occur through the internet. You can test it by renaming the server status script. You will receive an alert telling you that your site appears to be down and it will be directing the traffic to the backup server.
A more viable solution will be to get hybrid-MultiWAN and session-bonding technology that provides you with an automatic geographic server failover system. Give us a call if you want to equip your company with a geographic server failover system.