How SD-WAN provides a seamless failover experience

July 6, 2023

Managed SD-WAN Solutions

It is often quite tough to retain the productivity of your workplace if you have a poor-performing network. A dropped connection while using the Internet or your phone will make things tough to operate efficiently, causing great frustration to the employees. It is the main reason for connecting with a prominent Managed SD-WAN provider to manage your business efficiently.

An SD-WAN connection can keep your network up and running, along with assisting you in performing the tasks you need by using the Internet. Individuals would never wish to experience any call breakups, drops, or slow Internet.

Metro Wireless has delivered numerous SD-WAN solutions to businesses and understands the importance of having a reliable internet connection.

We aim to offer you the right information on SD-WAN and how it can help keep your network up so that your network and work efficiencies are resolved.

By the end of our post today, you will understand the importance of SD-WAN and how it helps keep your network running.

An Introduction To SD-WAN

You should learn about the other solutions that can help keep your Internet running at 100%. You might often be astonished by businesses with just a single point of failure, with most people having no other options. Those staying in the rural areas, mainly in the dark, even face such issues.

These days, businesses that have installed the costlier MPLS or Multi-Protocol Label Switching networks years earlier to route traffic efficiently are now installing the appliance-based SD-WAN with the failover. Essentially, SD-WAN is the box installed on-site to easily and automatically route the network traffic based on a couple of defined rules. It operates by taking better control of the IP address and seamlessly floating it from one network to the other when one service fails.

In numerous instances, more than having two distinctive providers is required. There are several combinations of ways to set it up. You can have a single wireless provider coupled with the cellular 4G LTE or a coaxial from your cable provider with fiber from the best SD-WAN provider. You can even establish a tertiary connection for added protection.

You will never know when one line goes down by transferring the voice and data to two providers. Essentially, neither would your customers. Establishing a failover through the SD-WAN is straightforward, like sourcing the secondary provider complementing your main one. The setup needs to pay several internet providers, although it might appear as a waste of money initially. However, you need to ask yourself which is more expensive. Whether the fixed monthly costs or the unexpected downtimes?

Top Managed SD-WAN solutions
Top Managed SD-WAN Solutions

It is not just about having a second line either, as it is regarding the first and the second line working together. LTE is ideal if you live in rural areas with several options. It is based mainly on the bandwidth requirements, who would get the service at the quickest, and the highly affordable providers, as you will have an SD-WAN and setup of failover and operating in your business in no time.

How SD-WAN Helps To Keep Your Network Running

The top SD-WAN providers can offer numerous perks to businesses struggling with communication and network issues. SD-WAN failover ensures your network has a reliable connection, resulting in 100% uptime.

Your network is up and running constantly with the SD-WAN automatic failover feature. The data packets can always send it over the fastest route with the ability for SD-WAN to automatically switch to a different path routing the traffic whenever a failover takes place.

You can even have greater control of the data being sent and control the kind of data you wish to get sent down the path. For instance, daily, your firm will use several paths at once.

Although you are using such paths, you can make greater choices with the data to ensure you send out every data you need more efficiently. For instance, voice traffic can only get noticed sometimes.

If you speak on the phone, you will hear your call break up or drop due to the data packet loss. Conforming with customers or employees at different locations is often tough whenever the voice traffic loses the data packets.

Whenever there is a path experiencing 5% packet loss, switch your voice to the better path and use this path experiencing the 5% packet loss for the data backups that still accomplish all your objectives.

The greater flexibility enables you to control and emphasize your data to the requirements of the organizations and customers' requirements.

You should emphasize the data that is sent out initially. If you have vital data that requires getting transferred to one of the companies' other locations, you might prioritize it by sending them out first over the rapid and highly secured path.

You can ensure that your data is sent safely to the receiving locations in numerous ways. You can get this done by monitoring the data paths out to the internet and data paths across several locations.

  • Monitor Paths To The Internet

You can easily manage and emphasize the data sent through the Internet by monitoring the paths to the Internet.

Suppose you send vital data to your customers. In that case, the data is emphasized over the rapid and the most reliable path and taken care of first over the one in the office using the Internet performing data backups or watching Netflix during the lunch breaks.

  • Monitor Paths To Multiple Locations

Like the ability to monitor the inbound and outbound traffic from the Internet; the same is done with the traffic from several monitored locations. You can emphasize the traffic and how you can get it done with the Internet traffic.

Benefits of SD-WAN for Businesses

The traditional network architectures would often suffer from the restrictions coming through the failover and the backup strategies. The conventional or modern approaches generally involve a primary internet connection with a secondary backup link staying idle till the primary link fails. The mutual failover process is often time-consuming, prone to flaws, and might disrupt services.

SD-WAN Failover
SD-WAN Failover

Alternatively, managed SD-WAN solutions can revolutionize how the networks get managed, offering numerous benefits considering the internet backup and failover. We will now look into why SD-WAN is beneficial to achieve a seamless failover capability.

  • Agility and Flexibility

SD-WAN can leverage the software-defined networking principles to dynamically manage the network traffic while adapting to the transforming conditions. SD-WAN or multiple internet connections from varied service providers can combine into a single logical network.

The greater flexibility will enable businesses to seamlessly switch between every connection in real time, ensuring uninterrupted connectivity during the failures of the primary links. SD-WAN can help monitor every connection's performance while automatically routing the traffic over the highly optimal path, whether the backup or the primary link.

  • Intelligent Traffic Steering

The solutions for SD-WAN benefit offer intelligent traffic steering abilities enabling companies to emphasize vital applications and direct traffic appropriately. SD-WAN can help detect the loss of connectivity on the primary link while automatically redirecting the traffic to the backup link during internet outages.

Intelligent traffic steering can ensure that vital business applications like video conferencing, VoIP, or cloud services continue functioning without interruption. SD-WAN can help reduce the impact of network disruptions on productivity and user experiences by intelligently managing the traffic flow.

  • Link Optimization and Load Balancing

SD-WAN optimizes the availability of the bandwidth across several links, along with offering failover abilities. It can employ advanced algorithms by distributing the traffic load evenly across every connection, enhancing network performance. SD-WAN rigorously monitors the quality of every link by measuring the parameters like jitter, latency, and packet loss.

Based on these metrics, it can intelligently direct traffic over highly reliable and stable connections. It can help ensure the efficient use of every available link while boosting the overall user experience. 

  • Simplified Management and Visibility

SD-WAN can help centralize network management by offering administrators a unified view of the network infrastructure. The IT teams can easily monitor and configure the SD-WAN devices' behavior, including the backup settings and failover, through the centralized management console.

This simplified management approach removes manual intervention requirements during failovers, reducing the risk of human flaws. Furthermore, SD-WAN offers real-time visibility into the network performances allowing proactive troubleshooting and instant resolution.

  • Cost-Effectiveness

Implementation of SD-WAN for Internet Backup and failover results in notable cost savings compared to the traditional approaches. Organizations can seamlessly leverage several cost-effective Internet connections through the different providers instead of only depending on the costly dedicated backup links with SD-WAN.

The redundancies ensure a greater level of availability without incurring any greater costs. Furthermore, hot failover SD-WAN and its ability to optimize traffic across several links effectively minimize the overprovisioning bandwidth requirement, resulting in more cost savings.

  • Enhanced Security

SD-WAN incorporates advanced security aspects, including the firewall and encryption abilities for shielding data transmitted through the network. In an internet outage on the main link, SD-WAN can seamlessly redirect the traffic to the backup link while maintaining similar security levels.

It can help protect sensitive information, reducing the hazards of data breaches or unauthorized access in failover situations.

  • Application Awareness and Quality of Service (QoS)

The SD-WAN solutions would offer application-aware routing and QoS or Quality of Service mechanisms that enable companies to emphasize mission-based applications and ensure optimal performances.

SD-WAN Management
SD-WAN Management

During the failovers, SD-WAN would wisely route the traffic based on the application requirements, guaranteeing that the vital applications would get sufficient bandwidth and low latency. The granular control over the traffic on the application aids in maintaining productivity and user satisfaction even during network disruptions.

  • Enables Cloud Usage

Companies are notably adopting cloud services. SD-WAN allows direct access to the cloud at the remote branches, which would eliminate the backhaul of the traffic that routes every cloud and brand office traffic through the data center where the workers can directly access the applications on the cloud irrespective of the location without burdening on the main network with additional traffic for securing and managing.

SD-WAN can enhance the performance of cloud applications by emphasizing the business-based applications that enable the branches to communicate directly on the Internet.

  • Improved User Experience and Business Continuity

SD-WAN would notably enhance the user experience while ensuring better business continuity by offering uninterrupted connectivity and seamless failover abilities. Employees can continue their work without interruptions, maintaining better productivity and meeting customers' expectations.

The seamless failover process would reduce the impact of internet outages, reducing downtime and the potential loss of revenue. The ability of SD-WAN to maintain reliable connectivity even in the face of main link failures can strengthen the resilience of businesses while fostering a positive user experience.

SD-WAN: The Future Of Business Communications

Managing the failover and routing these days with SD-WAN is cheaper for the future, and everything is done on the move across the single dashboard. 

SD-WAN provider at Metro Wireless showcases their abilities in the cloud. While some of the boxes already have built-in SIM cards, making them LTE-capable. Companies using wireless as their main provider will note 5G to change the game once it is deployed. Major changes are arriving to how everyone, from small to large businesses, is considering network management, and it is the ideal time to get ahead of this curve.

SD-WAN solutions at Metro Wireless are mainly designed to be flexible, allowing you to pick the product that best suits your requirements instead of adapting to the off-the-shelf, one-size-fits-all solution. It indicates that we can offer a cost-effective and simple pricing structure based on your service requirements.

Connect with us today to know more about how your business can benefit from SD-WAN.

Tyler Hoffman

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