Articles

November 2007

"Another new technology that Warner believes is beneficial is one developed by Elfiq that lets hotels use multiple Internet providers and still deliver a single IP scheme to a network. "For instance, I can have a T1 from AT&T and still add DSL, cable,  fiber, whatever cost-effective technology that there is," Warner says. "With a technology like this, what we're able to do is have the T1 and then look at cable and DSL and balance the Internet traffic across all of the providers."."

Source: Lodging Magazine

October 2007

"The power industry is not adding enough capacity to keep pace with worldwide demand. By 2008, 50 percent of today's data centers will have insufficient power and cooling.

By 2010, half of all data centers will have to relocate or outsource applications to another facility. During the next five years, 90 percent of all companies will experience some kind of a power disruption. In that same period, one in four companies will experience a significant business disruption.

Source: Data Center Institute"

An inconvenient IT truth (eWeek)

September 2007

"In an era when downtime is unacceptable, disaster recovery is more than a technology requirement, it's a business imperative. Companies that do it well stand to gain control and drive down costs.

Just a few years ago, disaster recovery was a technology problem; now, it's a business problem. Disaster recovery is changing as rapidly as business is changing. And at its core, disaster recovery involves technology, but recovery is quickly morphing into a euphemism for resiliency."

No Excuses (CIO Insight)

September 2007

"Elfiq Network’s Link LB (Link Load Balancer) 1500E is the next-generation model of rackmount entry-level link load balancer supporting up to eight WAN links and 150Mbps of WAN throughput. It supports hardware LAN failover and requires less than 25W of power consumption.

The LB-1500E redefines the entry-level rackmount field by providing an unmatched functionality/price/performance ratio and differentiates itself from the competition by operating at the data link network layer (Layer 2 inline/transparent operation) to manage synchronous or asynchronous telecommunication links. Elfiq Link LB implementation is simple and does not require IP address migration or changes to firewalls or routers. This approach prevents the use of complex protocols, such as Border Gateway Protocol, to support multiple links and reduces implementation projects."

Geographic WAN Link Balancing
Elfiq Link Load Balancer Lets You Better Manage Traffic & Meet Your Budget  (Processor)

May 2007

"Keeping the network up and running is no small task for most small to medium-sized enterprises. It's no big surprise that not all traffic on many corporate networks is totally business-related."

"... Making sure your business-critical applications get the bandwidth they need requires a mix of tools and techniques."

"... Understanding what's running over your network and what protocols are used is the key to keeping your critical applications available and responsive."

Bandwidth Management For Your Network (Processor)

December 2006

"Protecting systems and applications from downtime tops many IT managers'lists of 'things that keep me awake at night' with many systems going underneath the cautious eye of compliance programs such as Sarbanes-Oxley and stringent SLAs (service-level agreements)."

"Your HA strategy might be closely related and even overlap your DR (disaster recovery) strategy."

"... your HA strategy should extend to multiple routers, load balancers, and cross-connect switches. The key to high availability is not to have something  that dies"

"Adding high availability to your SME's network architecture can ensure that your applications infrastructure can meet the demands of stringent compliance programs and SLA agreements."

Ensuring High Availability - Build Redundancy Into Your Mission-Critical Infrastructure (Processor)

November 2006

"A natural or man-made disaster can strike anywhere, anytime, with ruthless and devastating results - that's the awful essence of a disaster. Hurricane Katrina and the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks loom large in the collective memory for the magnitude of their destruction, but smaller-scale, localized disasters happen all the time: a fire in a building, human error that erases a server, a power outage in a town. Each can wreck a business in minutes and is much more likely to happen than a terrorist attack or a hurricane.

As gloomy as those scenarios may be, the name of the game for companies is 'prepare for the worst; hope for the best.' Companies can minimize the worst possible disruptions to their businesses and the lives of their employees by creating disaster recovery and business continuity plans. Such plans are not just for large and well-connected companies, but for small and midmarket companies as well."

When disaster strikes (eWeek)

October 2006

"The objective of business continuity efforts is to cost-effectively minimize disruptions to normal business functions. It encompasses an understanding of the risks associated with key business functions, preventive measures, and the processes required to restore business operations in the event of a disruptive incident."

Not having a security architecture (IT Focus)


"WHEN DISASTER STRIKES: The most critical part of disaster recovery is testing a plan and testing it again at least quarterly to ensure it works. Disaster recovery operates on the rule that 20% is planning and 80% is testing."

Edgardo Gonzalez, Projects Recovery Specialists  (BaselineMag)

September 2006

"Although 69 percent of senior IT and business professionals believe a disaster or crisis is likely to interrupt their business workflow over the next two years, 60 percent have not increased their budgets in preparation, according to a study released Sept. 6 by infrastructure solutions provider Forsythe Technology, of Skokie, Ill."

IT business disaster preparedness lags (eWeek)

May 2006

"The rapid growth of Internet use to conduct business has created the need for enterprises to ensure that the services and servers on their network are always available to their employees, remote sites, customers and business partners. Moreover, enterprises may find it difficult, if not impossible, to conduct critical day-to-day business without Internet access."

IP Multihoming: Reducing Internet Access Down Time (The Burton Group)

October 2005

"The latest storms are forcing IT departments to take a big-picture view of business continuity."

IT Departments Thinking Big About Disaster Recovery (eWeek)


Prepping for Internet Outages (InternetWeek)

September 2005

"Hurricane Katrina wreaked havoc on communications and data networks across the Gulf Coast region last week, sending IT managers scurrying to implement their disaster recovery plans and patch together makeshift networks to keep their businesses running as best they could.

For the region's businesses, from metropolitan law firms to the Gulf Coast's plethora of waterfront casinos, meeting the challenges of continuity and disaster recovery plans was predicated on people and resources being available at multiple locations. The situation was exacerbated by mandatory evacuations."

Disaster Recovery Plans Fight Chaos (eWeek)

August 2005

Load Balancing Is Critical To Network Stability (Processor)

June 2005

Invisible traffic that steals bandwidth (Search Networking)

May 2005

"How to Optimize the Reliability of Your Enterprise Network? Your organization depends on the reliability of the network for business-critical applications and services in all aspects of operations."

Top 10 Ways to Optimize Network Performance  (SearchNetworking.com)

"So when you bought that Gigabit Ethernet NIC for your server, how much throughput did you think it was capable of?"

Numbers lie: Your NIC could be killing your network performance (SearchNetworking)

March 2005

Elfiq recommends resolving port speed and duplex issues with some configurations. Please read this article to find interesting information on incompatibilities in telecommunication equipment from major vendors:

Tests root out NIC problems (eWeek)

December 2004

"Businesses connected to the Internet via multiple ISPs face complex network implementation challenges, particularly when trying to optimize network performance and cost. Intelligent WAN infrastructure can help.

[...] Gartner recommends, however, that businesses with multiple megabits of variable-cost connectivity determine the cost-effectiveness of an intelligent WAN link load balancer.

[...] BGP-based traffic control has some weaknesses, which include:

• Load-sharing implementations based solely on BGP are effective from a reliability standpoint, but might not be optimal from a performance and cost standpoint. Real-time control requires specialized hardware.
• Whenever a link fails, there is a brief propagation delay while the new route is announced to core global Internet routers. The delay is usually measured in seconds, although full propagation will take several minutes, during which some parts of the Internet may be unable to reach the company’s network.
• BGP can be difficult to implement and requires that the company possess a network engineer with BGP expertise. Appropriate routing policies may be designed and implemented by consultants, which can be expensive.
• Businesses with address blocks smaller than a /24 are likely to have their route announcements filtered by many ISPs, causing BGP to be ineffective.
• Some ISPs may not be willing to cooperate in a multi-homing arrangement."

Businesses Optimize Multiple Internet Connections (Gartner)

October 2004

"When consolidating connections — whether multiple circuits that serve different needs or multiple circuits that serve a single need — network managers must ensure that redundancy is preserved.

[...] Businesses that want to avoid the complexity of a BGP implementation, or are interested in optimizing performance and cost of the links, should utilize either a WAN link load balancer or route control device."

Multiple Internet Connections Increase Performance, Create Complexity (Gartner)

"Businesses can improve their networks and lower costs by choosing the right combination of Internet service providers and routing Internet traffic over the most appropriate paths.

[...] Gartner recommends that businesses divide their traffic between their multiple ISPs based primarily on cost, rather than performance. Most ISPs deliver "good enough" performance for all but the most network-sensitive applications.

[...] Gartner strongly recommends that businesses evaluate an intelligent, real-time traffic management solution for their primary Internet gateway, as well as secondary sites with
peak daily Internet traffic exceeding 5 Mbps."

Pick the Right ISPs to Maximize 'Multihoming' Benefits (Gartner)

2003

"One of the greatest problems in the reliability of the Internet are the routing mechanisms. The failure detection and restoration times for common IP routing protocols

[...] while majority (90%) of changes in Border gateway protocol (BGP) routing information converged in 100-200 s, there were convergence times up to tens of minutes

[...] 99% of routing information updates are pathological and may not reflect changes in real network topology. [...] there is evidence that common inter-domain routing protocols are vulnerable to persistent route oscillations."

All IP - All Optical: Are Networks Converging or Diverging and Will There Ever Be All Optical Networks? (VTT)

December 2003

"Most enterprises have grown accustomed to adding bandwidth in response to growing application demands. Building a smarter WAN infrastructure is often a better investment.

[...] By 2008, investing in bandwidth efficiency solutions will be the primary WAN upgrade strategy for 75 percent of enterprises"

Enterprises Will Waste Money on Bandwidth in 2004 (Gartner)