Does your business have a ‘no internet’ backup plan?
It is vital for every business to strategically and proactively prepare for network failure. When internet connectivity goes down, productivity, business operations, profits, POS systems and customer satisfaction can suffer irreparable loses.
Having a backup system, also called a network failover, will save you time and money when your main internet service provider fails to keep you connected.
* The first simple and cost-effective solution that should be immediately considered is overlay failover for your existing infrastructure. It’s easy to do overlay failover with Cradlepoint’s ARC CBA850 bridge which converts LTE broadband to Ethernet by providing the existing wire-line router with a second WAN connection that is wired.
It’s easy to set up as well, as RHYNO Networks can configure it remotely with Cradlepoint’s NetCloud Manager.
* Redundancy is the next consideration. As multiple parts of a network can fail, it’s important to arrange for different types of redundancy to be in place. For instance, if your wired WAN connection goes down, you can failover to LTE as pointed out above. However, in the event that your router goes offline, you can take advantage of a second, parallel router by using Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP).
You can do so by having the correct hardware, such as the Cradlepoint AER1600 Series. The Cradlepoint AER1600 Series can take over as the primary router in the event of failure. Using a VRRP, which is a layer 3 protocol, empowers your business to take failover to a higher level by having plans for both internet failover and router failover in place. The entire network automatically switches over to the Cradlepoint router during ISP interruptions and outages, without the LAN and WAN connection being interrupted.
* Having out of band management (OOBM) is the next important element of network failover. Usually, when something goes wrong with a primary router’s configuration, it requires dispatching a technician to manually reconfigure the settings in order to restore network connectivity. With OOBM, RHYNO Networks can use LTE connectivity to remotely access the router and all LAN-connected devices that are connected to Cradlepoint’s ARC CBA850.
* Most businesses are exchanging multiple types of data simultaneously throughout the work day. If your primary WAN connection goes down, LTE failover is the ideal backup solution.
LTE is incredibly powerful because it supports high bandwidth, which your business can benefit from by utilizing LTE failover for load balancing. That way, critical traffic can be sent across LTE while public traffic can be easily routed through a land-based connection. If there were an outage, public WiFi can be shut off to preserve critical services and ensure failover when you need it most, while expanding bandwidth when you don’t.
* A multi-WAN solution can boost your uptime to “four-nines” uptime, which means an uptime of 99.99%. Most companies will not guarantee an uptime of more than 99.5% uptime. That number sounds impressive, but that missing 0.5% equates to four hours of downtime each month, which can become very expensive very quickly across multiple locations.
With multi-WAN failover and several failure detection and decision algorithms, Cradlepoint provides flexibility and robust failover and failback. Cradlepoint offers best-in-class mechanisms that allow for advanced multi-WAN management.
* If your business runs entirely wireless, there is a solution for you as well. The Cradlepoint COR IBR900 and COR IBR1100 both support multiple LTE connections as well as WiFi as WAN. This allows for wireless-to-wireless failover and makes it possible to go back and forth as needed between two LTE connections and WiFi.
* Technological advancements in hardware often cause technology to become obsolete in the blink of an eye. Future-proofing your network is a smart investment for both today and the future. By ensuring that you add adaptable technology to your network that allows for easy and cost effective upgrades, you’re not only doing what is financially responsible, but also what allows for easier future upgrades.
For example, with Cradlepoint, when the next generation of LTE modems is released, businesses can keep up with cutting edge technology by only having to upgrade the MC400 modem portion of their router instead of the entire router. This amounts to a considerable cost savings and allows your business to stay competitive.
It’s time for you to get started protecting your business with a ‘no internet’ failover plan. Give us a call here at RHYNO Networks and we’ll help you customize a Cradlepoint failover plan that fits your needs. (855) 749-6648
