Tag Archives: Chris Silva

About 2211 days ago Wireless Networks

Is Municipal Wi-Fi Right for Your Business?

A few years ago, many towns and cities reasoned that there are advantages to offering homegrown Wi-Fi. For one thing, meter readers and other municipal employees out in the field would have an easy way to file data to the home office. Free municipal Wi-Fi for poorer areas could, in theory, ease the digital divide. Another benefit is that municipal Wi-Fi could provide new revenues if small and mid-sized businesses proved receptive to the idea. So far, the jury’s out on the latter application. Municipal Wi-Fi is still so new that it’s too early to gauge whether it will be a hit with small and mid-size business users. Nevertheless, there are reasons why some businesses may want to consider opting for such services, providing that they understand the risks. The rise of municipal Wi-Fi Municipal Wi-Fi is a growing business. According to MuniWireless, a Garden City, N.Y., integrated media company that tracks the market, municipal Wi-Fi was a $116.9 million business in 2005, but jumped to $235.5 million in 2006 and is projected to hit $459.6 million by the end of this year. “It’s still a fairly young market, it’s still developing,” says Mike Perkowski, chief operating officer of MuniWireless. In communities like Philadelphia, San Francisco and Anaheim, Calif., where municipal Wi-Fi is now available, small and mid-size businesses might want to consider the option, especially if they are looking for cut-rate pricing for broadband Internet access and/or have a lot of employees in the field locally who need to feed data back to headquarters. Chris Silva, an analyst with Gartner Inc., of Stamford, Conn., says small businesses that have employees who are out of the office more than 50 percent of the time most likely already have some form of Wi-Fi, but those with employees that spend about 30 percent of time away should look into it. “It’s not for the traditional road warrior,” he says. “Folks that are thought of as not consistently on the road will be able to benefit from public Wi-Fi.” Cheaper than traditional wireless plans Municipal Wi-Fi tends to be cheaper than traditional wireless plans offered by telecommunications companies. “It’s not cost effective to roll out a $60-a-month plan for every employee,” Silva says, adding that his research shows 30 percent of businesses with fewer than 1,000 employees are already using some form of municipal Wi-Fi for at least one employee. So far, the largest third-party contractor for municipal Wi-Fi has been EarthLink, the former dial-up Internet service provider that now offers broadband service. EarthLink offers an entry-level service costs $21.95 for a 1 Mbps download speed, says Tom Hulsebosch, vice president of municipal sales at the Atlanta-based company. “Small businesses do it if they tend to have a lot of salespeople in the field,” Hulsebosch adds. EarthLink has so far rolled out municipal Wi-Fi in New Orleans, Philadelphia and Anaheim, Calif., and plans to launch service in Alexandria, Va.; Corpus Christi, Texas; and Pasadena, Calif., this year. As the list of locations expands, the company is also starting to market a fixed Wi-Fi offering targeted at stationary office environments. Such service starts at around $100 a month for a speed of about 3 Mbps. Hulsebosch says the service is up 99.9 percent of the time, but higher-end offerings will provide even less potential downtime. “We’re in the process of bringing those services online,” says Hulsebosch. “This is just the beginning.”

About 2241 days ago Wireless Networks

How Fast Should Your Network Be?

our beautiful site

That need for speed. Businesses of all sizes just can’t get enough when it comes to their wide-area networks (WANs). Small and mid-size business needs for WANs that can support more than simple Internet browsing keep growing as Web applications become more sophisticated and more in demand. Fortunately, a range of products and services are now available that can fill this need. Having a faster WAN translates into increased productivity, notes Chris Silva, analyst with Cambridge, Mass-based Forrester Research. “When you think about slicing the bandwidth, and sharing it with a group of people, a faster system helps everyone,” he says. But small and mid-size businesses looking to upgrade the speed of their WANs need to be mindful of changes already challenging traditional broadband service. While currently wireless local area networks (WLANs) or Wi-Fi networks are only limited to a “hot spot” range of a hundred feet or so, advances in this low-cost technology are coming soon that will expand its range to 30 miles or more and bring its speed in line with broadband, notes Plunkett Research Ltd. These changes will impact next-generation WANs, particularly as they are used in businesses where sensitive data about a company, clients, or employees needs to be protected. That type of information is likely to be communicated on a wired, not wireless network, as wireless networks can sometimes have security flaws. “Mission-critical information is likely to stay on a wired system,” says Gary Chen, small- and medium-sized business analyst with the Yankee Group, of Boston. WAN options in pursuit of speed What are the best WAN options for 2007? The following are the most popular for small and mid-size busiensses, although higher-speed (and more expensive) WAN options exist for larger or faster-growing companies. DSL: For small businesses, business-grade DSL service, offered by regional telecommunications providers (telcoms), can run at speeds up to 1.5 megabits per second. Cost: About $200 to install; between $80 and $320/month for business-class service. T1 Lines. Initially named after “Transmission — Level 1″ or Trunk 1, these lines are increasingly popular among small and mid-size business customers. A T1 line is a fiber-optic cable that can carry up to 24 digitalized voice channels and move data at up to 1.544 megabits per second. That’s about 60 times as fast as a residential telephone line, according to providers. To carry data, it requires the use of a router. For many small and fast-growing businesses, a T1 line can handle the broadband needs of the entire office. Cost: Due to increased competition, T1 lines have come down in price, with a leased line now running between $250 and $500 a month for service. T1 lines are offered by telcoms, Internet service providers, and others. Online sites such as Broadbandbuyer.com offer a way to comparison-shop for prices and service. T3/DS3 Lines. A T3 — also known as DS3, for “digital service” — is still mainly a product aimed at larger businesses or universities. A T3 or DS3 line carries voice and data across 672 channels at 43.232 megabits per second — the equivalent of 28 T1 lines. Cost: On average, telecom and other broadband service providers charge $2,800/month for T3 service — on the pricey side for many smaller businesses. Don’t forget the wireless For many businesses with mobile workers, the wired options above must be integrated with wireless technologies so that workers can stay connected to their computers wherever they roam around the campus. Most “wired” providers also offer wireless options, but experts warn that unless businesses address security concerns of wireless networks they should avoid using wireless communications to transmit their most sensitive company, customer, or employee information.

About 2241 days ago Wireless Networks

Waiting for the Next Wireless Standard

our beautiful site

The next-generation standard for wireless networking will have a great impact on small businesses, allowing more workers the freedom to work, collaborate, and be productive without being tethered to wires. That is the one thing about the much-ballyhooed standard, 802.11n, now under development, that is certain. But whether your business must wait to upgrade or can take advantage now depends most on how small your business is. The 802.11n standard — expected to replace the 802.11g standard in place since 2003 — promises to improve the range, speed, and security of wireless local area networks (WLANs), which are becoming increasingly common in the small business world. That means employees in an office will be able to wirelessly exchange data, access the Internet, or take advantage of cheaper phone calling over the Internet. This is because speeds will exceed what’s offered using wire-based Ethernet and up to four times as fast as current wireless standards. Many of the current problems with using wireless in an office are expected to be resolved with the new wireless standard, known alternately as just 11n or wireless-n. For one thing, wireless-n is expected to eliminate “dead spots” in the office. In addition, new security features can make businesses rest assured that their sensitive company data is safe and that hackers won’t imperil their systems. Really small companies don’t need to wait The long-awaited 802.11n standard has been caught up in the IEEE standards-making process and has already been delayed several times. Originally supposed to be in place by 2006, subsequent delays have come about in part because of wide-ranging interest in the standard. At this stage, final ratification is expected in early to mid-2008. That’s posed a dilemma for start-ups and other small businesses that are looking for WLAN products now. In anticipation of the new standard, “wireless-n-compatible” products already have been flooding the home-based business and small business market. Meanwhile, professional-grade product makers have opted to push their releases back as long as possible to include any last-minute changes in their wares.   What’s a small business to do? Small businesses with under 100 employees wanting to upgrade may as well make the jump now, advises Rodney Hall, president of Rodney B. Hall & Associates, a value-added reseller based in Cheltenham, Pa.  “We’re putting in [small business-grade] wireless-n compatible Linksys routers for people already,” notes Hall, an engineer.  “Businesses this size just don’t have the amount of traffic going across the router that will cause them any problem.” Hall says he’s confident in the Cisco-owned Linksys product, noting that Linksys will make any final changes required by the standard available in downloadable form to its customers. But businesses any bigger should wait for stronger wireless-n products to be released before upgrading, Hall says. “The [wireless-n compatible] routers out there aren’t designed to handle too much traffic,” he notes. “If you try it now, your router may not hold up.” Chris Silva, an analyst with Cambridge, Mass.-based Forrester Research, advises that, overall, “those small and medium-sized businesses that don’t have Wi-Fi now would be wise to wait for the new standard. If they do, they will essentially be future-proofed for the next 5-7 years.” Silva recommends that those with an interest in upgrading to 802.11n conduct an audit of their WLAN — figure out if they need more bandwidth, and what additional devices they might need, such as hand-helds and laptops. With this information at the ready, they will be prepared to refresh their Wi-Fi when the new standard comes. The future wireless office The 802.11n standard will increase Wi-Fi range to as much as two city blocks, beyond the 300-foot range provided by the current standard, 802.11g. The new standard is expected to improve patchiness in existing WLAN range, such as in building stairways and elevators, where Wi-Fi often doesn’t operate. But perhaps most importantly, it will more than quadruple Wi-Fi voice and data transmission speeds, providing speeds of about 270 megabits/second (Mbps). At present, speeds allowed under the previous three IEEE standards (802.11a, b, and g) range from 2 Mbps to 54Mbps. The new standard will be the first that can truly support multimedia transmission, a fact that has the PC, consumer-electronics and cellphone industries keenly involved in the standard’s development. An IEEE working group approved a draft 2.0 standard March 12, a sign that deliberations are nearly complete. A final draft, however, is not expected until early to mid-2008. Nonetheless, hardware companies have broken ranks on how best to prepare for  802.11n, with those serving the consumer/small business market already offering products. Intel’s Centrino semiconductor-chip line is billed as “Next-Gen Wireless N” compatible, and laptops including it are already for sale. Any changes to the standard could be uploaded onto Centrino through software, Intel’s website explains. Likewise, Linksys’s home/small business market router has been available for over a year. In addition to higher speed and reliability, the router offers numerous new security features, according to Linksys spokesman Trevor Bratton. But many providers of business-class routers and access points are waiting to offer new products until late 2007 so that their products require few if any changes. Companies such as Cisco, Aruba Networks and Nortel Networks “are currently limited to hardware based on ratified 802.11 standards,” according to a November 2006 Forrester Research report.   The new standard also seems to be triggering new levels of customer service. In an effort to reach out and educate its clients, access point-manufacturer Xirrus Inc. has created a “802.11n resource center” on its website that includes print-ready posters explaining the new standard and its predecessors. In the end, it appears that the very smallest companies — and home users — will have the jump on enjoying the benefits of wireless-n. But for the rest, there’s assurance in knowing that 802.11n will be worth the wait.