Instant Ethernet Fiber Network Quotes

Fiber optic bandwidth is in higher demand than ever before. More companies are now involved in video production and distribution, medical imaging has gone electronic, and IT in the cloud is bandwidth demanding. If only it wasn’t so difficult and time consuming to find out what fiber services are available and how much they cost...

How does instantly online sound? Too good to be true? Not anymore. The Telarus GeoQuote bandwidth search engine has been upgraded yet again. This time it includes the ability to get instant online quotes for Ethernet over Fiber in bandwidths from 10 Mbps on up to 1 Gbps (GigE). It’s not for residential users, but for business locations that need professional grade bandwidth. If that’s your company, go ahead and run an Instant Fiber Network Quote now...



GeoQuote is a patented software system developed by telecommunications broker Telarus, Inc. over the last 9 years. This breakthrough technology first made it possible to get T1 line quotes online in a matter of minutes by automating the same methodology that carriers themselves use to determine line prices. It was revolutionary in the last decade, when such price quotes often took days or weeks to obtain. Now that capability has been expanded to include Business DSL, Business Cable, Fractional T1, Internet T1, Bonded T1 lines, Satellite broadband, Fractional and Full DS3, Ethernet over Copper and Ethernet over Fiber.

To us the system, you simply enter some basic contact and location information, pick the service you are interested in, and push the button. The GeoQuote servers go to work crunching the database information appropriate to your particular business location and then deliver a list of services along with pricing.

How accurate is GeoQuote? The pricing should be considered budgetary, although it is highly accurate. What might be missing is any buildout costs peculiar to your particular situation. These have to be assessed on a case by case basis.

Not all locations have fiber optic service available. If that is true for your location, the system obviously can’t return a price for Ethernet fiber. However, you likely will qualify for another service such as Ethernet over Copper, DS3 or bonded T1. Also, there are services that may be available but must be manually quoted. That includes high bandwidth fixed wireless, SONET fiber optic services like OC-3, OC-12 and OC-48, and multi-location MPLS networks.

Not to worry. The product specialists at Telarus are skilled at working with the dozens of service providers offering business bandwidth. Let them give you a call to talk over your requirements and you’ll likely find that you have many more options that you thought possible and at lower costs that you’d expect. If you want to make contact or run an instant quote, do so now through our Fiber Network Quotes site.

Level 3 Shows How The Converged Business Network Saves Money

Network convergence has been an initiative for larger organizations since IP became accepted as the default network protocol. But smaller companies, with smaller or non-existant IT staffs, have paid little attention. That’s all changed recently. Now, convergence is for everyone.

Why the big change? The primary driver is cost savings, as it has always been. Cost savings has become an ongoing business process in this era of continuing austerity. But the real enabler is the availability of managed convergence. The carrier becomes your partner rather than simply a vendor. This relieves you of the burden of network management, especially WAN network management.

Level 3 has entered this space with its Converged Business Network solution. The idea is to use one bandwidth pipe for voice, Internet and VPN instead of three separate pipes. In one example, Level 3 replaces three separate T1 lines at 1.5 Mbps each with a single 3 Mbps connection that handles everything. That 3 Mbps link could be bonded T1 lines, or it could be one of the newer Ethernet services. They show stand alone services at $ + $ + $ being reduced to converged services for $.

A 3 to 1 reduction? That’s not unreasonable. After all, 3 Mbps Ethernet over Copper services are often priced about the same as a single T1 line.

How can you get a 3:1 line cost reduction without destroying quality of service? The answer is in two pieces. First of all, the bandwidth reduction isn’t that dramatic. You are going from 4.5 Mbps to 3 Mbps. Cost is going down faster than bandwidth. Second, the question assumes fully loaded line services. That’s seldom the case. Many companies have T1 lines because that’s the smallest commercial grade line service available to them. They wind up ordering 3 lines in order to keep voice, Internet and VPN applications separate so they won’t interfere. In reality, only a fraction of that available 4.5 Mbps is needed at any given time.

This is how a converged 3 Mbps WAN network can do the same job cheaper. QoS or quality of service controls are maintained on that connection so that time sensitive voice packets have priority over less time-sensitive data packets. At times when there are fewer telephone conversations in progress, that bandwidth is released for use by the broadband Internet or VPN services. This is called dynamic bandwidth allocation. In a situation with separate lines, any unused capacity simply goes to waste. It is not available for any other use.

A converged voice and Internet service called Integrated T1 has been on the market for years. However, its availability has been spotty and its focus has been on traditional analog and PBX telephony rather than the more advanced features of enterprise VoIP systems. Level 3’s service goes way beyond Integrated T1 with Ethernet connection speeds up to 100 Mbps as a standard package. That makes it an attractive service for medium and larger companies that long ago outgrew their T1 lines.

Is your company on the lookout for ways to save money while preserving quality of services? If so, you should inquire about the cost and benefits of network convergence. You could be missing out on a major advantage for your business.

Insatiable Demand For Ethernet Bandwidth

Not so long ago, 10 Gbps was considered an enormous amount of bandwidth. So enormous that it only made sense for carrier backbone networks. Not anymore. Now enterprises are gobbling up that much WAN bandwidth and looking for more.

Who could possibly require 10 Gbps, short of an Internet service provider or MPLS network operator? Financial services, streaming entertainment media and medical campus connectivity are three applications on the cutting edge of high bandwidth demand, as reported in Carrier Ethernet News. How much more would they like? Some are licking their chops at 40 Gbps and even 100 Gbps.

How can a carrier keep up? Make no mistake about it, competitive service providers are in a scramble to make sure they have enough capacity to supply this burgeoning demand for higher and higher bandwidths. The once impressive T1 line is now considered a small business service. DS3 still hangs on for medium size business applications. OCx SONET, recently the darling of large enterprises, is starting to see its flame flicker on the way out. What’s happening is more than a simple escalation of bandwidth requirements. It’s a wholesale move from legacy telecom services to Ethernet connectivity.

Why Ethernet? There are a couple of strong forces at work nudging WAN bandwidth suppliers in the direction of offering Ethernet rather than some other type of connection. The first is a realization that analog telephony, the impetus behind the buildout of the massive PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network), is now the smallest piece of the bandwidth pie. It’s the PSTN standards of T-Carrier & SONET that created the digital WAN services that have been pressed into service for data packet transport. The big piece of the pie is digital data and biggest piece of that pie is video.

No only are data packets the predominant information that needs to be moved from one place to another, but the networks generating those data packets are nearly all based on Ethernet. Why switch to something else just to get from one Ethernet network to another?

That’s what many carriers have concluded. Their new state of the art national and international networks are all designed to transport Ethernet packets. Those packets may represent voice from enterprise VoIP telephone systems, video conferencing or video streaming, medical images, or data file transfers. Interfacing and management of Ethernet bandwidth is more compatible with local area networks running Ethernet, but that’s not all. In most cases, Ethernet bandwidth is cheaper on a Mbps or Gbps basis than any other service.

How much cheaper? That depends on what facilities are available in your location more than anything. If you have competitive Ethernet services available, it’s not uncommon to get twice the bandwidth for the same money or keep the bandwidth you have now and get a big cost savings.

Can you ignore the Ethernet revolution? Only at the peril of your budget! It’s quick and easy to see what Ethernet bandwidth services are available for your business location. Why not take just a minute and put in a request for services and pricing now?

Ethernet Point of Presence Locator

You’ve been hearing about lower cost bandwidth options and wondering if you can get more Mbps for less money. The question is, “how can you find out?” What you need is an Ethernet Point of Presence Locator.

What’s that and what’s a point of presence? Ah, these are the keys to getting a better deal on business bandwidth.



Point of Presence, or POP, is a location where carrier services are located. For instance, a major competitive carrier may well have a central office located in your city. Within this facility is termination equipment for the carrier’s metropolitan and long haul fiber optic network. In other words, this carrier POP is like a station where you can get on and off their high speed voice and data network.

The same carrier may have POPs that aren’t part of their office facilities. Many carriers have POPs within colocation centers. Those are public facilities that specialize in housing server equipment for business users. They offer rack space, security, fire suppression, back up power and bandwidth. The bandwidth is provided by however many carriers choose to establish carrier POPs in the colo facility. Because your equipment is located within feet of the carrier POP, construction costs to provide you with bandwidth are little to nothing.

So, you’re looking around and don’t see any colocation centers or carrier central offices anywhere near your building. Does that mean that you are out of luck? No, not at all. There may be all sorts of POPs that aren’t readily apparent. The most prevalent example is the “lit” building. Lit means lit for fiber optic services. To light a building, fiber optic cabling and termination equipment must be installed and turned up. That’s generally only done when there is enough demand by one or more clients in the building for high bandwidth services. But once a building is lit, it can be used as a jumping off point to provide services to other buildings nearby.

The beauty of finding a lit building and its associated Point of Presence is that construction costs are minimal if you are next door to such a facility or within a short distance. The big cost of providing fiber optic bandwidth services is having to trench the fiber cable underground or suspend it overhead on utility poles for miles and miles. Bandwidth, especially Ethernet bandwidth, can be quite affordable if you don’t have to bear the capital expense of extensive fiber construction.

So, if they are not visible to the naked eye, how do you find these lit buildings? Fortunately, you have access to the Ethernet Building’s Point of Presence Locator. You simply enter the address of your building and get a map of nearby lit buildings in seconds. You can then get prices for bandwidth services you are interested in. It’s quick and easy, so give it a try. You may be surprised by how much fiber optic capability is hiding right next door or down the street.

Ethernet Cuts Costs, Expands Bandwidth

You know what a business tradeoff is, right? That's when you have to decide which of two things you want is more important because you can't have both. But what if you could have both? That's no tradeoff. That's a real business advantage.

Ethernet service falls into that advantageous sweet spot. It's more bandwidth for less money.

You read that correctly. More bandwidth. Less money. How can that be? It's a combination of technology advancement and new aggressive providers who are out to change the nature of telecommunications networking.

Until recently high bandwidth telecom services from T1 lines to DS3 bandwidth to fiber optic connections were primarily under control of the entrenched telephone companies. New carriers have come on the scene over the last couple of decades and spend that time and millions of dollars building regional and national fiber optic networks independent of the telephone companies. These new carriers offer advanced technology and aggressive pricing.

Technology is part of the explanation of how Ethernet can simultaneously cut costs and expand bandwidth. Telco networks have been based on time division multiplexing since they went digital starting in the 1950's. That was the right technology match to transport digitized telephone calls on a circuit switched network. But technology has been evolving since then and, with the dramatic growth of the Internet, packet switching has steadily displaced circuit switching as the network architecture of choice.

The new high performance digital networks are designed for packet switching from the ground up. They are IP (Internet Protocol) based. Some form the backbone of the Internet, of course. Others are kept private so that their quality of service can be carefully controlled. It's these private networks that offer what's called Carrier Ethernet, also known as Metro Ethernet.

Since Ethernet is the universal network protocol of choice for businesses large and small, it stands to reason that the most efficient way to transport network packets over long distance is to keep them in the Ethernet protocol. That's what the new Ethernet services do. They connect to your network switch or router and extend your local area network across town or across the country.

The combination of native Ethernet service and aggressive carrier pricing make Ethernet WAN (Wide Area Networking) the connection of choice for linking multiple locations or bringing in dedicated Internet access at high bandwidths. Service is available in a variety of bandwidth increments from 5 Mbps on up.

At levels of 50 Mbps and below, it's often possible to provision service over twisted copper pair wiring using the latest in line modulation technology. This means nearly any building within a couple miles of the nearest carrier point of presence can get Ethernet service. At higher bandwidths, up to Gigabit Ethernet, fiber optic connections are needed.

Find out if your building is already "lit" for Ethernet service or what might be available in the way of Ethernet over Copper (EoC) service. Check for Ethernet availability using the GeoQuote (tm) service finder.

Last Mile Connections That Make Sense

Competitive telecom networks have criss-crossed the country and penetrated every metropolitan area. Their modern IP networks, fiber optic bandwidth and dramatically lower prices makes them very attractive to businesses of all sizes. But how do you get connected?

Often, the most important, most expensive and most limiting span of a wide area network is the drop to the customer site. It's widely known as the "last mile" connection. Why last mile? Because that's a typical distance from a business location to the nearest carrier POP or Point of Presence. A POP is equivalent to a telephone company's CO or Central Office. You need a building where the equipment goes that provides a connection or "termination" to the carrier's backbone network. That's the POP.

If you are actually within a mile or even a couple of miles from the nearest POP, you've got options. There are many different ways to span the distance. Traditionally, analog telephone lines and digital T1 service came-in on twisted pair copper bundles that were installed as a matter of course when your building was constructed. They still do. In fact, a T1 line makes a fantastic last mile connection for PBX telephone trunking, VoIP SIP trunking, MPLS multi-point networks, dedicated Internet access and point to point voice and data connections to other locations. T1 lines are highly reliable and can be bonded together to increase bandwidth.

But aren't they pretty expensive? They were at one time. That's why many businesses had to settle for slower 64Kbps and similar connections from their facilities to a much faster Frame Relay network. These days, that's like hooking a soda straw to a fire hose. You can't possibly tap the capability of the core network when you're so bandwidth restricted.

Fortunately, T1 lines cost only a fraction of what they did a few years ago. Just in time, too. You need at least 1.5 Mbps for many business applications and multiple line telephone systems. The copper pairs that transport T1 service can also be reconfigured to carry higher bandwidth Ethernet service directly from a carrier POP to your location. Your connection is via a standard Ethernet jack for bandwidths from 5 to 50 Mbps. Once on the network, your connectivity can run across town or across the country, even the world.

If your needs exceed the capability of Ethernet over Copper, you need the big daddy of last mile connections: fiber optics. All the metro and long haul networks are now fiber-based. The bandwidths available go up to a Gbps, called GigE, and even on to 10 Gbps. Prices per Mbps of bandwidth can be half what you're paying for non-Ethernet service now, or even less. But you'll need to have your building "lit" for fiber optic service. Is it already lit and you just don't know it? Find out with this Ethernet service locator.

Are there any other options for last mile connections? Yes, and one of these might be just the right service at the right price. In some major cities you can get wireless delivery up to 45 Mbps. The trick is that you need to have line of sight to the carrier's transmitting tower. For lower speed applications, like point of sale terminals in small retail locations, wireless connections using cellular broadband works well and is very affordable. At distances of only a few hundred feet to less than a mile, laser optics equipment can "beam" your connection across highways, lakes and other areas where fiber optic construction costs are astronomical.

Still scratching your head over what last mile connection makes the most sense for your business. Let our team of experts help you sort it out so you can get the best deal on the bandwidth you need. Simply call the toll free number or put in a quick online quote request using our MegaTrunks bandwidth service.