Expertise Topics

BYOD
The explosive popularity of consumer devices has shown no sign of slowing. In 2013, smart phones are expected to be used as the leading device for consumers to connect to the internet. By 2015, tablet PC connectivity is expected to outpace laptops. It is no surprise that these devices are increasingly being brought into the workplace and used to perform both business critical functions as well as private user tasks. In fact, the average corporate user has anywhere from 2-4 mobile devices, most of which require wireless connectivity, and this number continues its steady rise. Along with redesigning and upgrading the wireless infrastructure to support these devices, some business organizations have started rolling out applications for employee use and custom app stores.
Data Center Solutions and Resources
Data centers today are transforming from a traditional, distributed infrastructure to a consolidated, and service-oriented structure. Whether growing to support high-bandwidth services or shrinking and centralizing systems, data centers are in a constant state of change. In Data Centers that are growing, servers are being virtualized and 40 Gigabit links are being installed to support consolidation of bandwidth hungry applications, which drive up the cost of network interfaces and put greater demands on the cabling infrastructure.IT Budgets are constantly being squeezed, putting pressure on engineers to get the most out of every switch, router, server, or hypervisor that is already implemented, in addition to consolidating resources and reducing power consumption. In some cases, services are being outsourced to cloud providers where they provide critical support to worldwide users. These changes must be made seamlessly with minimal downtime to production business applications and must result in increased performance to the overall system.
Virtualization
It’s no secret that Virtualization saves money, is well-developed and there are several high impact vendors on the market to choose from. It is here to stay, and if it hasn't already, it will soon make a permanent home in the data center. Garter reports that Virtualization has reached 50% penetration in the market, which means that a huge number of our mission critical applications are relying, in whole or in part, on virtualized services.Switches, routers, and other infrastructure devices are being consolidated and virtualized, creating whole network infrastructure environments within on one hardware platform. There are several impacts and key considerations with server and infrastructure virtualization, but most IT departments consider the cost and efficiency savings to be well worth the switch.
WiFi Analysis & Troubleshooting
Wireless networks used to be simply for convenience, but thanks to today's IT organizations, they can drive high performance applications critical to businesses, or in the case of medical facilities, deliver life-saving information to doctors, nurses, and healthcare applications. The explosive growth of tablets, Netbooks, and other mobile devices has driven the demand for Wi-Fi service even further as these BYODs (Bring Your Own Devices) are brought into the workplace and expect service.In the old days, the wireless network was only used in focused locations for a few data-based applications. Now, these devices demand voice, video, and data services - on the move. To meet these demands, some wireless environments are requiring complete overhauls to deliver thorough wireless signal coverage and high quality connectivity at high speeds, without sacrificing security. It used to be that supporting new users only required adding new access points. That is no longer the case. Since the wireless user of today requires more bandwidth for high performance, business critical applications, in addition to voice and video, signal quality as well as complete coverage is critical.