WAN & VPN

Introduction

There are many WAN technologies in existance today, with newer and faster technologies constantly emerging. The preferred choice of WAN technology will depend on several factors (from bandwidth to budget), and these should be taken into consideration when designing the WAN topology and understanding the company's requirements. In addition to accessing external resources, WANs are used to connect LANs and other networks together so that users and computers in one location can communicate with users and computers in other locations.

One of the main issues in traditional WAN connections is the selection of the appropriate physical WAN technology, which include:

• ADSL - Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line is a type of DSL connection that utilises regular copper phone lines on frequencies on that aren’t taken up by voice calls. It doesn't require any new cables to be installed at the user's premises, but has a maximum distance of about 2Km between the premises and the telephone exchange, and offers bandwidths of about 24Mbs.
• VDSL - Very-high-bitrate Digital Subscriber Line is a type of DSL connection that utilises regular copper phone lines (similar to ADSL), but it makes more efficient use of the line itself. It doesn't require any new cables to be installed at the user's premises, but has a maximum distance of about 500m between the premises and the telephone connection box, and offers bandwidths of about 80Mbs.
• Fibre - Fibre internet does not use standard copper telephone lines, but rather uses fibre optic cables to the user's premises. Speeds of up to 1Gbs are possible, but as they require new cabling to be installed (and supported by the local telphone exchange), the availability is limited at present.

A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is a secure connection that shares the infrastructure with other traffic (e.g. unsecured internet). It can be used for several purposes, but is mainly for:

• Site-to-site - this is when a secured link between two or more sites is required (e.g. to connect multiple office together).
• Remote access - this is when a secured connection for a remote worker is required to connect to the company's internal network.

There are many technologies available to accomplish the requirements of a VPN (both hardware and software solutions), with new technologies being introduced all the time.

Services

Whilst it is very difficult to estimate the amount of work required to design and implement a new WAN/VPN solution from scratch, we have two packages available based on the size of your organisation (and the estimated complexity of your network requirements). In addition to the packages offered below, we can tailor the design service to your unique needs.

All our network architects and designers are CISSP and Cisco certified with years of experience working with networks of varying sizes and complexity.

Additional Services

Jovasi Technology is a security minded company, and we always design secure networks which give good protection against cyber threats. Why not prove to your customers that you take cyber security seriously, and become certified with Cyber Essentials.