In making your business continuity deployment decision(s), the easy part is that you have two primary choices for a secondary connection to the router at your distributed site:
Now it gets more difficult. Which is right for you? The answer, of course, depends on several factors, and that answer may vary site by site. Every coin has two sides.
The traditional method of providing network continuity, a secondary wireline connection, generally provides high network availability, security, and performance, especially private wireline services such as T-1, T-3 and Metro Ethernet. The flip side of that coin, is that wireline solutions can be relatively expensive, especially in context of capacity or “bandwidth”. This is measured in cost / Mbps (Megabits per second).
And, wireline solutions can be complex to deploy and manage. As such, services from multiple service providers must be aggregated and managed. Customers with diverse distributed sites often have to be the “integrator” and manage multiple provider relationships to gain the coverage they need, yielding cost and complexity.
For these reasons customers are considering the other connectivity option: Wireless. In particular, next generation 4G or Long Term Evolution (LTE) Wireless services can help improve network and business continuity. Wireless connectivity provides the following benefits:
- Availability – Dual wireline links can be subject to outages from the same terrestrial interruption such as line cuts and natural disasters. Recent history is replete with examples of network downtime experienced from earthquakes, hurricanes / flooding, and freezing. Network diversity gained from a secondary wireless path can help improve availability and provide business continuity benefits.
- Cost Effective – Especially for secondary connections that have low utilization, Wireless services can be a cost effective way to gain network continuity.
- Easier to Provision – Wireless services provisioning is typically measured in hours or days from time of order receipt. Wireline connection provisioning can often be measured in terms of weeks or months.
- Flexibility – With a wireless connection the router can easily be moved to another location, and can also operate while in motion for fleet applications – trucks, cars, buses, trains, etc.
- Reduced Complexity – The major wireless providers have broad national footprints. This broad national coverage can many times allow for that single provider to deliver services to all distributed sites thereby significantly reducing customer complexity in managing providers, service levels, billing, etc.
The flip side of the wireless coin, is that wireless connections can have lower performance than wireline connections in two primary areas:
Where bandwidth is the capacity of the network, or the size of the container, throughput and availability are the ability to consistently and completely fill that container over time, and to do so with a low error rate and latency, in order to improve the performance and benefits of the network.
Wireless networks can have lower throughput and availability due to:
- Site Location – Distance of the site from radio towers, multipath interference from radio signal reflections, and radio interference due to weather and other sources are among key contributors to this consideration.
- Router Location & Antennas – Poor “line of site” from the router to the radio tower / cell site, and inferior antennas used to propagate radio signals.
- Shared Access – Throughput can depend on how many devices at any one time are sharing the bandwidth provided by the radio tower / cell site.
- Weather – Inclement weather can degrade wireless signals.
And, these factors do vary over time. That said, your wireless network doesn’t have to be battered by the tides and currents of wireless variability.
Significantly increased performance and reliability of your wireless routing service is gained from optimal RF planning, antenna type and placement, and wireless service type. Done right, these can even reduce variability due to inclement weather.
To help you further explore these considerations when designing and deploying your critical, must work business continuity network services, we offer the guide for Cisco ISR Best Practices for Verizon LTE, or The Guide.
Whether used to help you in your own DIY deployment, or to provide you context to inform your work with one of our top Partners, in The Guide you will find best practices and details to aid RF planning and design, antenna considerations and selection criteria, and service modalities to increase throughput over shared access facilities.
You will also gain tools you can use to customize and extend wireless business continuity services to respond to real-time events, automate tasks, create customized commands, and take local automated action based on conditions detected by the Cisco IOS Software.
There are two additional topics to consider in the decision to Wire or to Wireless:
- Quality of Service (QoS)
- Network Security
The Guide provides an in depth analysis of these topics, including details on gaining private network security via next generation LTE Wireless services.
We can also connect you with other leading technology vendors. These industry leaders have made significant investments to gain certifications in both the Cisco and Verizon Wireless Partner Programs. You can get more information by contacting us at information@nowiresnoworries.com