Location: California, USA

Industry: Manufacture and distribution of soldering, desoldering, and rework systems

Number of employees: 39

Product in Use: GFI MailEssentials™, GFI FAXmaker™, GFI WebMonitor™ & GFI MailArchiver™

Quick read

American Hakko Products, Inc. is a manufacturing and distribution of soldering, desoldering and rework systems company that has seen considerable growth in recent years. The increase in users on the network has also called for an increase in available bandwidth. However, the company noticed that excess amounts of corporate bandwidth were being used by staff to browse websites that were unrelated to business needs and the threat of web borne viruses became a concern. To address this growing problem, they decided to install a web monitoring system to have greater control over users’ Internet activities. After successfully deploying other products from GFI Software, they installed GFI WebMonitor.

Challenges

The majority of companies use the Internet on a daily basis in order to do business, communicate and work more efficiently and faster. Most companies also allow employees to use the Internet because it is an intrinsic tool for them to do their job, however being connected to the Internet also raises a number of issues, not least cyberslacking, the risk of malicious code or viruses being downloaded as well as access to illegal or improper websites.

Chris Stuber, IT Manager at American Hakko Products, Inc. commented that the company felt the need to install a technology solution to control this issue due to the “allocation of a limited corporate bandwidth to non-essential use that was in no way related to the business at hand; as well as the need to provide an additional layer of virus protection due to the increased number of users and increased HTTP traffic.”

American Hakko Products, Inc. had been aware of these problems when the company was smaller and when an employee was found to have abused his/her Internet privileges they would be spoken to and made aware of the possible threats that uncontrolled and non-work related browsing could have. However, as the company grew and employed more people, management needed to tackle the problem and educate users in a different way because the one-to-one talks were no longer convenient.

Mr. Stuber said, “Previously, when the organization had fewer users, it was easier to address the issues directly with the users, who reacted responsibly and curbed usage that was not work related. With fewer users, it was also easier to train them in how to mitigate possible virus and/or adware infections. As we increased the number of users, we found it more difficult to address the issues with the users directly and making it stick. We would see a reduction if the issue was brought to their attention, but the old habits would quickly return.”

At that point, the company decided to look for a software product that would provide them with reports about Internet usage within the organization and allow them to block sites that were unproductive to a working environment or might cause offence to workers. They also wanted a product that would scan downloads from websites for viruses and other malicious packages, thus reducing the risk of malware infections and unauthorized material being downloaded. American Hakko Products, Inc. had already been using GFI products and so they added GFI WebMonitor to their setup.

“We started using GFI MailEssentials six years ago; we trialed GFI WebMonitor a year later after implementing Microsoft’s ISA Server. GFI FAXmaker was added three years ago, and we purchased the full version of GFI WebMonitor at the end of 2007. We added GFI MailArchiver this year,” Mr. Stuber said. “After we started using GFI MailEssentials, I was very happy with how well it integrated with the other Microsoft solutions we had in place in our network. I was also very impressed at how well the GFI products worked and the very reasonable cost.”

Mr. Stuber said they did evaluate other software products before choosing GFI WebMonitor however it was the best product that suited their needs and existing setup.

“We considered some other alternatives from Symantec and from Blue Coat Networks. We have had a lot of experience with Symantec and their systems have worked very well for us, but cost and complexity ruled out the Symantec solution. The option provided by Blue Coat Networks would have taken us down an unfamiliar path, and I did not want to implement a solution that adds another vendor into our network’s mix. The fewer vendors, the less likelihood of the old problem of vendors pointing fingers at, and blaming, each other when the customer has a problem.”

Implementation

Since American Hakko Products, Inc. already had GFI products installed, the implementation of GFI WebMonitor was a smooth process as all GFI products integrate easily with each other and with other Microsoft software applications.

“Applications were very simple to install and typically worked immediately after install with no special configurations needed. They work extremely well with the other Microsoft products we have on our network, including ISA Server, Exchange Server, and SQL Server. While benchmark testing can detect latency in our network at certain points due to the added services that are now running, and the added steps that must be completed, users do not see any reduction of network performance.”

Within minutes of installing GFI WebMonitor American Hakko Products, Inc. were able to generate the reports and results that they needed to exercise the necessary control over their employees’ browsing habits. The level of anti-virus provided by the software also proved to be very effective and necessary as it identified an infected file in the system.

“After implementing GFI WebMonitor, we could easily identify those users that needed to have their use of the Internet monitored and managed. We were also able to identify bandwidth loss due to processes running on workstations that were non-essential. Within the first month, the virus scanning ability of GFI WebMonitor also proved the need for multiple layers as a file provided by one of our vendors was found to have a virus, even though the vendor’s own anti-virus software did not detect the problem.”

Benefits

One of the various benefits of installing GFI WebMonitor is that it automated the task of manually having to sort through logs of Internet activity thus freeing up time for the IT team to work on other projects. Management also started receiving reports on the use of the Internet and it served as a deterrent for employees who started thinking twice about using the Internet for non-work related stuff. Furthermore, it helped to close the door to possible infections via web-borne threats.

As Mr. Stuber explained, “it provided management with a method to validate effective allocation of corporate bandwidth and reduce concern over workstation downtime due to infections of viruses and/or adware on workstations. It also provides excellent audit trails that helped us identify questionable activity by a former user. It also allowed for more effective use of IT staff resources on other projects rather than performing the role of web traffic cops.”

The technical benefits revolved around the seamless integration that the software had with their existing setup. “It provided excellent integration into the existing LAN environment and worked very well with other services without the need of excessive tweaking. Integration with Microsoft’s ISA Server is excellent and the GUI is very simple requiring very little time to train new IT staff on how to use the product,” Mr. Stuber added.

In financial terms, GFI WebMonitor proved to be a cost-effective solution in terms of both time and money.

“While the pricing model used for WebMonitor was higher than we had seen in the past, the cost savings in recovered hours lost more than paid for the purchase. Previously, IT staff would have to parse out the logs from Microsoft’s ISA Server in order to identify bandwidth loss, or to answer questions from management on the use of certain resources by certain employees. This process would typically take hours to complete, but by using the GFI product, the information can now made available in seconds.”

Support is also another important factor especially the availability of online and phone support for licensed products: “Whenever I have a question regarding the products, I am very impressed at the support I get from GFI,” he said.

Target Reached

“After installation, the added ability of the IT staff to quickly identify problem users actually provided a deterrent for all users, keeping non-essential use of bandwidth very low. There was no longer a need to parse huge log files for the data needed to identify the problem areas, and the ease of use made it as simple and reliable as turning on the lights to our IT Center when the staff arrives in the morning.”

“The use of GFI WebMonitor has allowed us to leverage human resources toward work related tasks more effectively, decreasing the hours lost by 60%.”

Links

For more information about GFI WebMonitor, GFI MailArchiver, GFI MailEssentials and GFI FAXmaker visit:http://www.gfi.com/webmon/, http://www.gfi.com/mailarchiver/, http://www.gfi.com/mes/ and http://www.gfi.com/faxmaker/respectively.

_{All product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.
May 2009}

FalconStor® Network Storage Server (NSS) Virtual Appliance for VMware® Infrastructure

Industry Overview

VMware provides powerful server virtualization for small and medium business (SMB) and remote/branch office (ROBO) environments. In order to ensure high availability in these infrastructures, organizations need to leverage shared storage for disaster recovery (DR). Today’s SMB and ROBO environments need a solution that can complement and enhance the capabilities of VMware High Availability, VMware VMotion, and VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler, eliminating the cost and complexity of building a SAN.

Solution Overview

The FalconStor® Network Storage Server (NSS) Virtual Appliance for VMware Infrastructure eliminates all barriers to server virtualization and brings affordable enterprise-class data protection and virtual SAN technology within the reach of any organization. FalconStor NSS Virtual Appliance is a pre-configured, production- ready virtual machine that creates a virtual SAN on a VMware ESX hosts by turning internal disk resources into a shareable pool of storage without the need for external storage arrays, SAN switches, or costly host bus adapters (HBA). Internal disk drives are detected by the software and incorporated into the management console through a simple GUI. Storage can be provisioned and securely allocated via iSCSI over standard Ethernet cabling. To enable high availability (HA), the FalconStor NSS Virtual Appliance can be deployed on two VMware ESX

hosts that provide shared storage with each other as well as additional VMware ESX hosts.

By consolidating all the elements of a shared storage environment, the FalconStor NSS Virtual Appliance provides a cost-effective solution that delivers highly available

shared storage in a VMware Infrastructure environment. Thin Provisioning technology and space-efficient snapshots further decrease costs by minimizing consumption of physical storage resources.

Solution Benefits

The FalconStor NSS Virtual Appliance provides enterprise-class data protection features including mirroring, replication, and application-aware snapshots that can maintain up to 64 point-in-time copies of each volume. Snapshot images provide

100% transactionally consistent copies of application data for fast recovery, as well as testing, development, auditing, reporting, etc. Thin Replication minimizes bandwidth utilization by sending only unique data blocks over the wire. Built-in compression and encryption further reduce bandwidth consumption and enhance security. Tape backup for multiple remote offices can be consolidated to a central site, eliminating the need for distributed tape autoloaders and associated management headaches, extra tape media costs, and other overhead.

VMware and FalconStor

The FalconStor NSS Virtual Appliance features a unique, TOTALLY OpenTM architecture, which allows it to integrate readily with existing infrastructures, including VMware environments and technologies. This virtual appliance creates a virtual SAN on a VMware ESX host by turning internal disk resources into a shareable pool of storage. It enables key enterprise-class VMware features, including VMware VMotion, VMware High Availability, and VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler. FalconStor NSS Virtual Appliance offers fully application-aware snapshots that serve as a secondary source for VMware Consolidated Backup (VCB), limiting the impact on existing VMware ESX production servers.

Download the full White Paper in PDF format:
Falcon Network Storage Server White Paper (34)

Summary

Providing quality customer service is a vital component to the success of any business, but it is especially crucial when dealing with healthcare products that affect one’s quality of life. Hearing aid manufacturers work in an industry where the ability to design a quality product, and deliver that product quickly, is of the utmost importance.

In today’s market, an effective e-commerce Web application, coupled with traditional call center ordering, is important to compete successfully. Dispensers often utilize the Internet as their first resource when researching companies and products; therefore, an easy to use order placement application is essential. In addition, professional guidance is integral to developing a comprehensive, integrated, company specific solution.

As Widex decided to enhance its e-commerce capabilities to improve customer service and expedite orders, it knew that a robust e-business application integrated into its existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) software package was the key component to a successful launch.

Customer Profile

Widex U.S.A., founded in 1956, is one of the most respected names in the hearing healthcare industry. The innovative and remarkably small hearing aids provided by Widex have helped millions of hearing impaired adults and children.

Problem

Widex needed a Web-based solution to deliver customized content and applications to its hearing aid dispensers. The company wanted to provide dispensers with self-service capabilities, such as order placement, training registration and access to current product information. In addition, dispensers were phoning the call center or mailing in order forms to secure new products, with above average turn around times. Widex wanted to ease pressure on its call center, especially since a good portion of the incoming calls were customers tracking orders.

To help improve customer service and speed delivery times, Widex called on VAI (Vormittag Associates, Inc.) to develop a customized e-Commerce solution.

Objectives

For Widex, the primary incentive for implementing an e-Business solution was to deliver superior customer service and achieve optimal customer satisfaction. To meet the goals of call-center call reduction, improved order accuracy and decreased order distribution times, it was important to install a practical and integrated Web-based solution that ran on the IBM Power Systems with the IBM i operating system and integrated with its existing ERP package.

Finding the Right Partner

Selecting VAI to implement a comprehensive e-commerce solution was an easy decision, since Widex was an existing VAI customer. Widex knew that VAI would listen to their needs and had the technical capabilities to ensure that the solution was tailored to meet those needs. “We were already running VAI’s S2K ERP package, and we knew that we could rely on them to get the job done. We also wanted to ensure system continuity, so choosing VAI for our e-commerce solution was an easy decision. VAI designs their software specifically for the IBM i platform, and it was important for us to maximize that technology investment,” said Joe LaMonte, Executive Director of Information Technology at Widex.

Solution

Process

VAI implemented its S2K Commerce Express package and the IBM WebSphere® Portal Software for Widex in April 2006. After reviewing the company’s needs, VAI customized the solution, which gives dispensers the ability to order/reorder hearing aids for patients using an electronic version of the ear impression. This has sped up the reorder delivery process significantly.

Since VAI was familiar with Widex’s business, the implementation went smoothly, only requiring 5-months to implement.  VAI worked closely with Widex to ensure that the solution addressed the company’s primary goals. As such, VAI’s software provides Widex with a unique portal solution to help improve employee productivity, cut costs and strengthen relationships with customers and trading partners.

VAI’s Director of e-Business Development, Todd Endsley, commented, “Widex provided an interesting opportunity for VAI to expand a company’s current ERP usage into a user friendly, customer oriented, yet powerful application. The addition of S2K Commerce Express and WebSphere allows Widex to service their online customers efficiently and effectively. We are pleased that Widex chose VAI to help them achieve their customer service goals.”

Using the Solution to Solve the Problem

VAI’s S2K Commerce Express and IBM’s WebSphere Portal solutions really fit the bill for Widex– it allowed them to leverage their investment in the IBM i and provided a cost effective, flexible framework for delivering variable content and applications to their dispensers.

Evaluation

Results and Benefits

Widex has empowered its dispensers with access to greater amounts of product information and educational support. Through VAI’s e-business solution, Widex is a resource to its dispensers. The company’s Web site now offers training seminars, a knowledge center, a pediatric center and a wealth of downloadable information that was previously sent via mail. Widex has always been a customer centric company and the new and improved Web site is the next step in enhancing its customer relationships.

Notably, Widex was able to greatly reduce the number of faulty and illegible order applications. Previously, between 10 and 20 percent of all orders had some human error or required a call back for information verification purposes. Now that the order process has been automated, it virtually eliminates this problem.

Perhaps the most important thing that Widex ‘delivers’ to its customers is quality of life. For the hearing impaired, hearing aids provide an opportunity to communicate effectively with those around them and as such, Widex understands that prompt delivery is essential to its customers. If a hearing aid is damaged or lost, it is vital that Widex provide a replacement quickly. VAI’s e-Business solutions have helped the company keep this promise.

Customer Quote

Joe LaMonte recalled, “The e-Business project addressed our service issues nicely. With automated options and enhanced customer accessibility, we are confident that our customer service capabilities will continue to exceed our client’s expectations.”

Download the MS Word version of this case study:
Widex installs eBusiness Application (33)

For More Information

For more information about VAI products and services, call VAI at 1.800.824.7776 or email sales@vai.net. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to www.vai.net.

When RHUB Communications entered the hotly contested Web conferencing market in 2005, research indicated that there was a need for an on-premise solution that required little or no IT support. As such, RHUB gladly took on the challenge of meeting the market’s demand by entering the industry with an on-premise “plug and play appliance”. Since the code for Web conferencing was already running as a SaaS system, and the development environment was based on Windows 2K, the natural first step was for the company to find a Windows based hardware platform for delivery.

To get things started, RHUB decided to focus on small and medium sized businesses using the indirect sales model.  Since the user environment was typically going to be a small office, the hardware platform was developed with specific characteristics in mind, like:

• An appliance that’s small in size
• A solution that makes no noise, therefore fan-less
• A solution that is on 24 x 7 and therefore uses very little power

RHUB sourced several x86 based platforms running embedded XP as the operating system for testing. The requirements quickly lead to a low power Geode or Via based system. Then, a unit was selected and a channel development effort was undertaken. Early feedback about the approach was very positive, but the early channel partners indicated a need for a lower priced, entry-level product.

RHUB’s research showed that the low power x86/Embedded XP platform would not meet the cost objective for the entry-level product. The only platforms available that could meet the cost objectives were either based on XScale or ARM processors. An ideal hardware platform was found utilizing the XScale processor. This platform met every requirement for the user with the advantage of very low power consumption (less than 5 watts). However, the hardware platforms would not support embedded XP in any fashion. The OS was far too large for the memory and flash available on the XScale platform and the added cost of the Embedded XP OS was a significant factor.

RHUB also wanted to deliver enterprise level units in a typical 1U form factor so an investigation of a Linux solution was undertaken. The development team was very pleasantly surprised to find a total Linux solution that not only enabled deployment on the XScale platform but also allowed a completely compatible code base for the 1U platform.

An Embedded Linux development effort was undertaken. The effort lasted about 4 months and involved building an absolute minimum OS environment, not just for size issues but to also insure no “backdoors” were open. RHUB wanted the on-premise appliance approach to offer users additional access security over SaaS models as one of the advantages of the approach but also wanted to make sure that the RHUB appliance could not be used for unauthorized network access.

Much of the effort was expended in just sizing the kernel. The resultant OS, including libraries ended up about 100 times smaller than the Embedded XP environment.  In addition, the cross compile effort was straight forward enabling a consistent code base.

Table 1: OS hardware requirement comparison

In addition to the size, performance and compatibility advantages of this approach, the engineers were pleased with the network support software such as DHCP and LDAP client available with Linux. The primary function of the appliance is a network device so rich networking libraries were important. Compared with the Microsoft networking libraries, the Linux networking libraries are easier to use and very stable.

The final product, called TurboMeeting, was readied in about one year from the initial development effort and the new hardware platform met every market and channel requirement. The Linux implementation was surprisingly stable and the code base between the embedded version and the 1U version was virtually unchanged (other than cross compiling).  Auto update was added to TurboMeeting about 6 months after launch. The TurboMeeting appliances have been in the field for about 2 years and have had 6 updates. All updates have been completely transparent to the customer and there were no changes required to the Linux core libraries in that time period.

More About RHUB’s TurboMeeting

RHUB adopted a “meetings accessible for all” approach by developing a web conferencing and remote access appliance called TurboMeeting that you pay for one time – and then forever you own it and control it. In addition, as one of the most comprehensive on-premise solutions in the market, TurboMeeting is the first solution to deliver four complete collaboration technologies in one appliance – allowing customers to not only do web conferencing, but to also conduct webinars, deliver remote support to clients, and to have remote access to personal PC capability – all with one box.

Moreover, RHUB’s TurboMeeting technology delivers the first “Guaranteed Attendance with No Download” Web Conferencing and Remote Access appliance in the marketplace, meaning the attendees are guaranteed access to your meetings and that no downloads of any kind are required with our view-only solution.  Unlike WebEx and GoToMeeting, NO monthly subscription fees are required with TurboMeeting – once you pay for it, you own it and control it.

Finally, with TurboMeeting, IT security is greatly enhanced since the data shared via the web conferencing solution is actually protected inside of the corporate firewall, instead of data being shared “on the outside” and unprotected across the Internet. TurboMeeting also delivers two layers of protection – both Data Transmission and Access Security, and, no additional IT Resources and/or IT maintenance cost is required for deploying this solution.

Learn more at www.rhubcom.com

Download the MS Word Version of this document:
Embedded Linux Enables Low Cost Deployment for Web Conferencing Company (16)

Recognizing the need to ensure reliability and improve performance in supporting their internal business users and external customers and partners, and provide a networking solution that addressed business continuity, C&D LLP deployed PowerLink within their Southern California offices. In doing so, they were able to gain Internet reliability and faster performance for both voice and data communications.

C&D LLP realized the importance of their Internet connectivity, as it has become an essential element for conducting their business. C&D LLP uses the Internet for electronic filings for tax returns, document management, accounting software and other accounting functions. They also rely on their Internet connection for VoIP, email and the web to communicate with their clients.

They had a single T1 connection that was essentially their voice and data umbilical cord for their office and remote workers and partners, as well as communicating and sharing files with customers and government agencies. Unfortunately, they experienced ongoing network outages and performance issues, which adversely affect employee productivity and the ability to fully service their clients.

They asked CompuVision for a solution that would bring resilience into their network, enabling them to have redundant Internet connectivity that would automatically load balance and failover traffic among multiple network connections.

CompuVision recommended Ecessa’s PowerLink WAN link controller that automatically load balances inbound and outbound network traffic, and ensures network uptime by automatically directing traffic to only the network connections that are working properly. Now that PowerLink added the network redundancy that C&D LLP needed, along with their T1 connection, they added a broadband cable connection. In addition to the benefit that network redundancy provided, C&D LLP discovered an added benefit from greater overall throughput.

“C&D LLP was looking for a solution that would provide them with seamless failover between ISPs in the event of an outage, and the ability to control bandwidth for different applications and user traffic”, states Chris Francesconi, regional manager at CompuVision. “We recommended Ecessa’s PowerLink, because it met the business continuity requirements that C&D LLP had. “In fact, a big part of our decision to recommend Ecessa was because PowerLink is an affordable solution for protecting organizations from events such as natural disasters. Here in Southern California, we are confronted with wildfires and earthquakes. Through building in redundant network connectivity, if one service provider has an outage, PowerLink automatically fails over to the other ISP. As part of our ongoing effort to ensure business continuity for our customers due to the potential for natural disasters in our area from fires and earthquakes, we found that building in network redundancy and failover addresses our customer concerns.”

“PowerLink is a great solution for our partners that want to deliver fantastic value to their clients, as CompuVision did with C&D LLP,” states Ron Thomas, president and CEO of Ecessa. “In addition to providing WAN reliability through multiple, diverse WAN connections to protect against failures, PowerLink enables greater overall throughput by directing traffic among all the network connections.”

“I find great peace of mind that C&D LLP is now safe in the knowledge that if one of our ISPs has an outage, our employees, partners and clients will not be affected. Powerlink will automatically direct our users to the other ISP connection,” says Pat Malvarose, Network Administrator for C&D LLP. “This is a perfect solution for our company. Now, we are protected in case one of our service providers has an outage, or one of our network connections is bottlenecked.”

CPA accounting firms are finding great value in the ability to load balance and have failover for both incoming and outgoing WAN connections. For example, with inbound connections, when clients and remote employees and partners that are working from home go to the company’s site, and one of the service provider network links has an outage, PowerLink becomes the DNS authority, removing the address of the broken network connection so that the users go only to the working network connections. For outbound connections, when employees are working on client accounts, or sending and receiving files to clients, PowerLink intelligently manages the network by conducting health checks on each WAN link to determine network availability and performance, and load balances each session across the links to deliver the optimal user experience.

Download a PDF version of this Case Study:
powerLink Series Case Study Accounting Firm C&D LLP Uses Ecessa to Ensure WAN Reliability and Performance (54)

Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES acts as a network hub for seven school districts. Tompkins-Seneca- Tioga campus gets its Internet connectivity from Central New York Regional Information Center and Time Warner Cable’s Road Runner Internet services. The other school districts associated with Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES also get their Internet services from Central New York Regional Information Center, with fiber connectivity (100Mbps) between the schools and the Tompkins- Seneca-Tioga campus. Between the Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga campus and another school district there is a 1Gbps link, and a 200Mbps link to the Central New York Regional Information Center that ties all the regional schools together. Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga has between 400-500 users consisting of both faculty and students using cell phones, laptops, PDAs and desktop computers to access their web services.

Overview

Recognizing the need to improve performance and lower their cost for bandwidth in supporting their internal campus and external schools, Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES deployed Ecessa’s (formerly Astrocom) PowerLink 100 WAN Link Controller. In doing so, Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES was able to:

• Dramatically lower their bandwidth costs
• Provide WAN link load balancing to ensure high-availability and improved network performance
• Provide redundant inbound and outbound Internet connectivity to help ensure that web services are not interrupted

The Challenge

The primary challenges Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES faced were the high cost of bandwidth and poor network performance. Some of the applications they support are web filtering, streaming video (for lesson plans), email, library catalog and other web services.
While needing to remain connected to the regional WAN with local school districts, they needed a solution that would enable them to aggregate multiple network links, while lowering bandwidth costs. Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES was paying $3,200 for 1Mbps of bandwidth, and their users were competing over the limited amount of bandwidth that was available. They needed more bandwidth, and at a lower cost.

The Solution

In September 2008, Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES began research to determine how to best meet their need for lowering their bandwidth costs and improving network performance. After looking at several potential solutions, the company selected the EcessaTM PowerLink 100 WAN link controller as it offered the most comprehensive and affordable solution.
The PowerLink was instrumental in providing exceptional performance for the company’s internal campus users, and off-site VPN users with VPN failover, while delivering WAN link failover protection. After deploying PowerLink, users experienced a noticeable network performance improvement. Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES also relies on the PowerLink for reliable ISP connectivity to ensure users are directed over working WAN links.

About
PowerLink aggregates ISP links to help manage bandwidth costs, while delivering a seamless user experience even in the event of a service provider outage. Advanced product technology is obviously important, but if the service and support behind the products is inferior, the technology doesn’t matter. This fact was not lost on Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES. “Anytime I’ve needed to know something, or needed something resolved, Ecessa’s support organization has always been available to help me,” states Dan Parker, Network Specialist at Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES. “In addition to the product benefits, from a customer-service standpoint, I’m very satisfied with the overall experience I’ve had with Ecessa.”

The Benefits
By adding another Internet service provider (RoadRunner), Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES was able to significantly lower its bandwidth costs. Using the PowerLink aggregation capabilities, they were able to increase from 2Mbps of bandwidth that cost them $3,200 per year, to 9Mbps of bandwidth, adding an additional 7Mbps while keeping their bandwidth costs to less than $3000 per year. “In addition to dramatically lowering our bandwidth costs, after deploying PowerLink, users experienced a noticeable network performance improvement.” says Parker. “Enhanced performance over the Internet was a critical goal for us. After we deployed the PowerLink device, we noticed a significant improvement in network performance. It turned out to be 100% better than we thought it was going to be.”

Download a PDF version of this Case Study:
PowerLink Series Case Study Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga BOCES (13)

Since 1971, D.O.E. Technologies has helped small and large law firms build, maintain and grow systems for managing case files. D.O.E. installs and supports networks, servers, workstations and peripherals; hosts applications and databases; provides Internet connectivity; and offers professional and technical consulting. Users rely on D.O.E.’s network to provide safe and secure access from around the world at any time

While evaluating performance charts, D.O.E.’s owner saw upward trends in usage and was concerned about the company’s ability to meet growth predictions. Although customers were not yet experiencing access problems, D.O.E. wanted to be proactive. The owner predicted that if the company did not act soon, users would experience slow performance, or even worse, periods of no access to their critical case files.

D.O.E. was already using a competing product for load balancing and failover. However, John Hagan, network engineer for D.O.E., says that product did not have the capacity to handle increased traffic loads. He needed to either upgrade to a newer version or switch to a different supplier. He discovered Ecessa and decided to evaluate PowerLink.

Ecessa provided several units for D.O.E. to try, and Hagan ran these in parallel for a few weeks to test their performance. Even though Hagan was more familiar with the interface of his existing system, he decided to switch to PowerLink. He says he could not justify spending twice as much money with the previous supplier when PowerLink offered similar or superior performance at a more attractive price point.

“If two hammers pound in a nail the same way, I’m not going to pay twice as much,” says Hagan. “But in no way is PowerLink a ‘cheap’ device. I didn’t sacrifice any performance or reliability.”

Ecessa helped D.O.E. ensure that PowerLink worked smoothly in their network before switching over to the new device. Hagan says the cutover was seamless, and he received no customer complaints.

D.O.E. is currently using PowerLink to balance loads across three Internet circuits. To accommodate new clients, they plan on adding to or upgrading their connectivity. Their existing PowerLink application will easily handle the increased bandwidth. In addition, PowerLink can reroute traffic automatically to another site if D.O.E.’s main location goes offline.

“PowerLink is designed to be transparent, trouble-free and uncomplicated. It’s rock solid, which is more than I can say for other equipment,” says Hagan.

Hagan says PowerLink gave D.O.E. the breathing room they were looking for and that he rarely needs to even think about the device. “If we had not added PowerLink months ago, we would have a more difficult time accommodating the new clients we are adding.”

Download a PDF version of this Case Study:
PowerLink Series Case Study- “It’s Rock Solid, Which is More Than I Can Say For Other Equipment" (10)

Before cable Internet reached its home office in a rural town of 1,800 residents, Healthland relied solely on T1 internet service. In urban areas, the final leg for delivering connectivity between the provider and the user can be mere blocks. In Glenwood, that final leg spans 75 miles where wires can be inadvertently cut during construction, resulting in outages that last up to days. When Healthland added cable as a secondary Internet connection, Paul Codner, IT manager, did not know yet about Ecessa and purchased a product from FatPipe Networks for load balancing.

Codner says he and his team tried for a year to implement FatPipe and received inadequate technical support. “After many attempts, we could not get it to work in our network,” he says. “Finally, enough was enough, and we pulled the plug.” Unable to return the product, Healthland is left with boxes of unusable equipment.

After this frustrating experience, Codner dropped the idea that load balancing was viable for his network. For two years, Healthland was compelled by contract to pay for a second Internet connection without automatic failover. Although they did not experience any major outages during this period, Codner says he knew their luck would eventually run out.

A cold call from an Ecessa reseller introduced Codner to PowerLink. The timing was fortuitous. Healthland was expanding its customer support services to include online incident reporting. They were also countering recruitment challenges inherent with small-town companies by hiring developers elsewhere in the United States and overseas to work remotely. Codner was concerned about the heavier strain expected on Healthland’s network and decided to see how Ecessa was different from the failed implementation he had experienced with a competing provider.

Ecessa immediately impressed Codner by guaranteeing its products. In addition, they offered comprehensive and accessible technical support. Codner says he also liked the fact that PowerLink is a hardened network appliance without any moving parts and uses a web-based configuration interface.

During the PowerLink implementation, Healthland’s firewall provider was unsure how to incorporate the device into their systems. Ecessa sent them two units for testing and helped them configure the firewalls and test the network. “Ecessa went out of their way to help our firewall provider and ensure that everything would work,” says Codner.

Codner’s experience with Ecessa’s technical support team was also markedly different from his first experience. “When I do need help, I’m not pawned off to a first-level support person who has limited technical knowledge,” he says. “The same engineers both install and support the devices. They know the ins and outs of their products and can jump right in to help me.”

Since the implementation, Codner says PowerLink has easily balanced loads during several outages and fully managed Healthland’s bandwidth requirements. He says it meets all of his needs, and he may even add a second PowerLink as a backup in case mother nature decides to strike.

“Purchasing PowerLink was a no brainer,” says Codner. “Ecessa helped us and our firewall provider configure, test and install the device. PowerLink simply works and is a lot less expensive.”

Download a PDF version of this Case Study:
PowerLink Series Case Study - Purchasing PowerLink Was a No Brainer (43)