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Bandwidth in Little Rock, AR? 71

Posted by Cliff from the expensive-bytes dept.
ioctl asks: "My company needs a 45Mb link from mid-town Little Rock, AR (University exit, I-630) to North Little Rock, AR (Wildwood exit, I-167). Our telco doesn't have any glass in the area, and wants about $800K over the next 5 years to build it out. We looked at another local provider who has the buildout already done, but their tech didn't show for the initial meeting (My boss: "He forgot it?!?!"). We've also looked into doing wireless via TCBY Tower (Proxim Tsunami or Aeras Networks Wavelink), but they are > $80K, plus rooftop space. Does bandwidth have to be this expensive? Are there any other possible solutions?"
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Bandwidth in Little Rock, AR? More

Bandwidth in Little Rock, AR?

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  • Don't forget... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by kinnell ( 607819 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @08:51AM (#8247557)
    A van full of hard drives. OK, it's probably not applicable, but you didn't mention your latency requirements ;-) Might look good in your report as evidence of "thinking outside the box", though.

    • Re:Don't forget... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      This is actually a very good point. Do you really NEED a 45mb connection? Why? What for?

      If after considering all the alternatives (VPN over DSL, mailing CDRs, etc) you decide you still need this fibre connection then... yes. Bandwidth is that expensive. Sorry!

    • Re:Don't forget... (Score:4, Funny)

      by splattertrousers ( 35245 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @11:27AM (#8248965) Homepage
      I can see this headline in the Little Rock local newspaper:

      Van Flips, Spills 350 Hard Disks Full of Porn
      Cops Have A "Hard" Time Cleaning It Up

    • Re:Don't forget... (Score:3, Informative)

      by ioctl ( 19935 )
      We thought about that, but it doesn't provide us with a hot-backup site. Latency would just be a little too high. =)

      • Another possibility (Score:4, Insightful)

        by 0x0d0a ( 568518 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @07:25PM (#8254324) Journal
        If the *only* high-bandwidth needs are for hot-backup, you may be able to, use colo or perhaps, cut a deal with another company's offices (one that could be reached more cheaply with high bandwidth) that also wants to run off-site hot-backup systems -- you supply hot-backup systems for them, they supply some for you. I don't know whether this is standard business practice.
    • If all you need is for remote backup and basic data exchange, you should split up the problem. For backup, have local backup that can then perform remote backup during the day. You get exceptional speed for local backup, then more time for the remote backup. A couple of T1's MUXed together should work.

  • Is it me or... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Komarosu ( 538875 ) <[nik_doof] [at] [nikdoof.net]> on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @08:55AM (#8247578) Homepage
    Dunno, 80k for a wireless link with just the minimal of support fees sounds good, especially for 45mbps. Considering the facts that theres no telco fees involved with a wireless point-to-point solutions (unless i'm being extremely dumb).

    • Re:Is it me or... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by AKnightCowboy ( 608632 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @09:10AM (#8247664)
      Dunno, 80k for a wireless link with just the minimal of support fees sounds good, especially for 45mbps. Considering the facts that theres no telco fees involved with a wireless point-to-point solutions (unless i'm being extremely dumb).

      No kidding. How big is this company if they can't afford an $80k investment in hardware? I'd snap that up at the drop of a hat since you'll have no per-month fees to pay to a telco. Obviously they're big enough to justify 45Mbps worth of bandwidth so I'd think $80k up front would be a drop in the hat.

      • If I were making the decision myself, and could just sign the check, we'd have done this already. Unfortunatly, the 2004 IT budget has already been finalized, and the 80K just isn't there (we run a really lean IT shop).

        Maybe we'll just have to wait until 2005 to do this, or go with wire-line service...

    • Re:Is it me or... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by 4of12 ( 97621 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @09:34AM (#8247823) Homepage Journal

      And if US$ 80K seems stiff, maybe you can sell off chunks of your BW to other business to help make the mortgage payment on it.

      With the prime lending rate at 4%, that $80K is a little under $270/month, probably a lot less than what you're paying for space and other utilities already.

    • Re:Is it me or... (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Froggie ( 1154 )
      $80k /per annum/ is in the right ballpark for renting the fibre you need, so I don't see why $80k fro equipment, plus minimal rent, should be too expensive. And companies, like people, can get loans.

  • um... take another meeting with that local firm? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Artifex ( 18308 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @08:58AM (#8247591) Journal
    Seriously, call the company, ask to talk to the president of the company, explain to them that his tech almost cost him a major deal, and asks if he still wants one.

    Oh, and if you get on good terms with that company, let them know there's at least one network engineer laid off from an international Tier 1 provider living in Dallas, Texas, who talked you into giving him another chance and would looove to move in and replace that tech :)

    • Second that (Score:5, Insightful)

      by 0x0d0a ( 568518 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @09:37AM (#8247843) Journal
      The story submitter should call the local firm back. Don't get me wrong, I realize that the tech left a bad impression (i.e. is bad service going to dog them through their dealings with the company?), and the folks probably feel snubbed. However, as someone else pointed out, this is not a multimillion dollar deal. It's bad, but people also do occasionally forget things. Heck, I've made a couple of mistakes and oversights in my life, and I've been glad when people give me a chance to make good on it. Maybe the guy's wife just broke up with him, maybe some other company kept having emergencies that he had to handle and got overwhelmed, forgetting about the appointment. Maybe his PDA that he used to keep appointments with was stolen and he's been trying to adapt to using pen-and-paper. Who knows?

      Giving folks a chance to make one mistake, unless you're in a situation where a particular mistake absolutely cannot happen is not a bad idea. It can't hurt (aside from a bit of the submitter's time) to bring the people in. He can always decide not to go with them. Given the amount of money on the line, it seems like worthwhile being gracious may be worthwhile.

      Also, as others have pointed out, have you considered all possibilities? Do you really need a 45Mbps link? Can you get away with mirroring some fileservers on each side, or something along those lines? We don't really have any idea of what you're doing.

      Just a thought -- It might also be worthwhile to hire a local network engineering consultant to give his advice as to what's best to do. He might know of worthwhile things that other local companies have done.

      You might consider working a deal with any other businesses interested in doing the same thing and maybe even the city. If there are other businesses that desperately need network connectivity or could reduce their ISP fees by joining into such a thing, perhaps the people asking $800K could be made to give a better deal, or at least split costs.

      If you decide to do rooftop links, remember that the failure conditions are different from lines. Depending upon the sort of system you decide upon, bad weather can negatively impact your link.

      [Sigh] There's just so little information that it's hard to give more than very basic guesses as to what you want to do.

      • Re:Second that (Score:4, Informative)

        by ioctl ( 19935 ) <afward@[ ]il.com ['gma' in gap]> on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @12:21PM (#8249534)
        OK, my bad...

        We are trying to do multiple things:
        - AD Replication (not much bandwidth)
        - SQL Replication (average usage isn't much, but overnight processes generate multiple gigs of changes, and have to be done before 5am)
        - File Replication (Big bandwidth; scanned documents & the like)
        - Line-of-business Apps (Big SQL bandwidth; they aren't very efficient, but we didn't write them, so... =P )
        - VOIP for 24 lines (1.5Mb or so max)

        We also need to be able to grow pretty significantly over the next few years.

        Something else is that the LR location will be moving within the next 2.5 years, and most local telco's won't touch a short lease for this much bandwidth...
        • Something else is that the LR location will be moving within the next 2.5 years, and most local telco's won't touch a short lease for this much bandwidth...

          I would recommend you move before investing in such a fat pipe to be honest. You've survived for awhile with how it is, so why not just suck it up and deal with it until your where you can play far more in advanced. Maybe even get it to that when they move the pipe is already there and waiting.

        • Re:Second that (Score:4, Insightful)

          by 0x0d0a ( 568518 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @07:02PM (#8254142) Journal
          Okay, well, let's see. If you're going to change this anyway in a maximum of 2.5 years, stopgap solutions should work. I'm a software guy, so the approaches that I'd think of try and work around needing the link in the first place:

          * I'm not familiar with AD usage, but perhaps you could get away with whatever lower-bandwidth connectivity *is* available (business DSL?) at both locations.

          * VoIP -- May be able to get away with a dedicated business DSL line again. More a question for telco folks. Issuing cell phones may be an answer (and these have benefits of their own).

          * SQL replication/File replication -- if there's any way to simply dump changes to a hard drive, this may be a good time to consider the van-full-of-CDs approach that someone suggested (or more likely, a USB 2 hard drive). Can you afford to have someone drive a hard drive across town each night for a maximum of 30 months? This has the added benefit of saving you on FedEx or whatever physical transport mechanism you use. With file replication, you may also consider use of a more advanced distributed filesystem like Coda that can lazily propagate data and use distributed servers.

          * Line-of-business Apps: Not sure. Depends on what you can get away with. If you can't just mirror a DB -- one side really does do writes that the other side may need to read right away -- and you really do have serious read and write bandwidth usage on each side, then you may be stuck WRT a high-speed link.

          You may need to squeeze your growth estimates, if you're going to move in the next 2.5 years, especially if it's more likely to happen in six months. You might also consider the networking issue as a factor in accelerating any move in progress.
        • From the little bit you've told us, I am guessing that you're throwing bandwidth at your issues and haven't put any effort into the bigger issue of optimizing your networks.

          The first thing I would do is look into centralizing your applications and change the delivery methods. Why have these piggy SQL server calls traversing the network? If you can't get the frontend converted from SQL native to a web-based system, then at least consider going to terminal services for that app.

        • Re:Second that (Score:2, Informative)

          by ioctl ( 19935 ) *
          Well, that worked out a lot better than I had anticipated... We called the local guys back, and they have now quoted us about $4650/Month for 100 Mbit/s fiber, and minimal buildout. This is probably just as well, because the rooftop space on TCBY tower would be about $1000/Month (found that out this morning). Anyway, thanks!

    • Re:um... take another meeting with that local firm (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      The question is why they are talking to a "tech" to begin with. Call the Sales Department -- those guys are on commission and won't forget to show up.

  • Do you really need 45Mbps? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Keyoke ( 588112 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @09:21AM (#8247731)
    I'm not familiar with the area, but you can MUX a handful of Ts together I suppose. If your still in the 0-mile area of a provider, that might not be too horribly expensive. I don't know what Ts cost out there tho. If you don't need more'n about 10Mbps, this might work. I think the most I've ever seen MUX'd is 8 Ts.

  • Uhm... (Score:3, Informative)

    by pi_rules ( 123171 ) * on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @09:25AM (#8247755)
    I'm no expert, but DS3 lines (capable of up to 45Mbps) run over copper just fine. You're probably better off if you can get fibre, but copper will do in a pinch.

    • Re:Uhm... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Doco ( 53938 ) <{moc.ekleo} {ta} {naD}> on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @11:06AM (#8248737)
      DS3 does run over copper - but it can't over twisted pair. It is generally run using coax cable, and not exactly the cable-tv type of coax either. The equipment is set up for a 75ohm impedance, and expects repeaters on a regular basis. If the cable isn't already there - you might as well run fiber as it will be cheaper because of fewer repeaters and give you more bandwidth.

      • Re:Uhm... (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Quill_28 ( 553921 )
        See now that's a useful response.

        No flaming or calling the original poster stupid. Gives a nice precise techinal answer without inflating himself.

        Well done.

  • well (Score:5, Informative)

    by Kraken137 ( 15062 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @09:25AM (#8247756) Homepage
    my company just recently switched from an OC-12 to a pair of gigabit fiber connections between our Conway and Little Rock offices... no idea how much we pay per month for it, but SBC *was* able to do it.
  • might it cost less than $80k to move the company to where the bandwidth you desire is available?
  • Move whatever operations that require 45MBps to an area where high speed fiber is available.

    Paying outrageous fees or investing lots of money into oddball technology is retarded these days. You don't have to look hard to find industrial or commercial areas where high-speed telco access has already been installed by a local government or development authority, or where the state government will give you tax breaks or grants to install such equipment.

    Universities operate tech parks as well, here's an exampl
    • Paying outrageous fees or investing lots of money into oddball technology is retarded these days. You don't have to look hard to find industrial or commercial areas where high-speed telco access has already been installed by a local government or development authority, or where the state government will give you tax breaks or grants to install such equipment.

      Exactly, the city my business is located in, Burbank, CA, laid down something like 2,000 fibre optic lines throughout the commercial areas of the cit

  • Talk to the City and County (Score:3, Interesting)

    by LWATCDR ( 28044 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @10:48AM (#8248568) Homepage Journal
    You City and County planers might know of an area in town that would be better suited to your needs.
    You local Economic Development Commision might also be willing to help out. Tell them you are looking to move out of the Town, County, and maybe State. They might have grants and Tax incentives to help you.
    Anything doing with computers is still considered high tech and usually clean. Planners love software development firms. Ask them for help to keep you there. That is what they get paid to do.
  • That's ridiculous! Haven't you ever heard of the Cantenna [cantenna.com]? Just stick a couple of those on your roof and you are good to go!. ;-)
    • That's what I originally thought of, but my boss (the CIO) won't do that... "You want me to bet our disaster recovery on *what*?". He's probably right, too.

  • Read RFC 1149.... (Score:4, Funny)

    by callermann ( 629230 ) * on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @11:09AM (#8248780) Homepage
    Pigeons...lots of pigeons...

  • Quoting Buzz Lightyear: (Score:4, Funny)

    by Rick the Red ( 307103 ) <Rick.The.Red@nOsPaM.gmail.com> on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @11:15AM (#8248844) Journal
    My company needs a 45Mb link from mid-town Little Rock, AR to North Little Rock, AR
    You're a sad, strange, little man, and you have my pity.

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @11:45AM (#8249180)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • I don't think they are in my area, but I'll look in more detail later.

      802.15.3 won't work for us, because of the distance limitation. We have a minimum of 6.7 miles to cover in the longest hop.

  • Cogent (Score:2, Informative)

    by Brett333 ( 261105 )
    My company just went with a new isp that apears to also be in Kansas City (dont know if they are in your area or not).

    www.cogentco.com

    100Mb for $1000/month
    Full Fiber Network

    • Re:Cogent (Score:3, Informative)

      by tomblackwell ( 6196 )
      cogent has an abysmal reputation. Many hosting companies, will bill their bandwidth as "Non-Cogent", which is considered a valuable feature.
    • The university I work for has a Gigabit connection to the internet through Cogent Communications. $10,000 a month. They had some initial problems with the connection, but it has been rock solid ever since that first month. Here's a link to our Network Status [georgetown.edu] page.

  • Nuvox can help you out. Nuvox is a CLEC in LR (Score:4, Informative)

    by NuvoxEngineer ( 751429 ) on Wednesday February 11, 2004 @11:52AM (#8249241)
    http://www.nuvox.com is a CLEC that has a presnece in Little Rock. We have customers in the Little Rock area and have solutions available to customers such as yourself. We have different options available to you regarding this solution and would be happy to speak with you regarding this. I am in Little Rock and I am available for a discussion with you. Shoot me an email to discuss. gphillips@nuvox.com.
  • Why on earth do you think you need that much bandwidth? Where is the bandwidth going? Most smallish companies (the ones that balk at $800k) don't need more than a couple T1's.

    If you REALLY need that kind of bandwidth, take a long look at co-lo'ing your servers somewhere. You can get the bandwidth relativly cheeply, and house all the high bandwidth stuff at the co-lo. Then you just remotely manage it. Have some way to do send large batches of data to the colo (say large capacity tape drive, or maybe so
  • We've also looked into doing wireless via TCBY Tower ...

    I guess the frozen yogurt market has some stiff competition these days, eh?

  • For $800k, it might just be cheaper to move your operation across town.
  • Move 45 miles...
  • Have you checked to see if there is any unused municipal dark fiber?

    In some areas there may be fiber owned by the city/state/county that is not being used.

    It might be possible to get the rights to some of that fiber if your company has any relationship with the local govt... If not, a good alternative might be to dedicate a vlan and ports on your switch to have for example a library located at each location interconnected. You essentially would be providing the backbone hardware for the library / local ci
  • An alternative might be to aggregate the required bandwidth using available connectivity (DSL, business cable internet, T1, lower-speed point-to-point links). Depending on local costs, this may not be cost prohibitive.

    As a side benefit, since your connectivity will be diverse, individual carrier and facility outages will only degrade your connection, not sever it.

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