A TRUE cowboy setup is using MPLS with a single line. It's far cheaper to have redundant, separated path lines without MPLS. So while dual carrier MPLS is possible, is that actually what you are implementing? If not, I'd consider the MPLS route the wild west cowboy approach.

Nothing residential? I already know what ISPs the other offices around here use. I was hoping it would show some magical residential fiber connection in my neighborhood (that isn't AT&T's fiber to the pole a mile from your house with shite old copper from said pole to my house).

@Dashrender said in Just when you thought VoIP wasn't scary anymore...:

@scottalanmiller said in Just when you thought VoIP wasn't scary anymore...:

They say that phones are dirtier than toilet seats, anyway!

They say that about kitchens too.

Moral: the world is a gross place.

@scottalanmiller said in Anyone have Fixed Wireless?:

@JaredBusch said in Anyone have Fixed Wireless?:

@Mike-Davis said in Anyone have Fixed Wireless?:

I know a successful wireless ISP and basically in his part of the country it's cost prohibitive to get copper, let alone fiber, to his customers.

I have worked with a successful fixed wireless company in the past as well. it is most certainly a good solution as long as it is done correctly. Not really any different than any other solution. Do it right and it works well.

Exactly. It's almost all about the ISP in question, not the technology itself.

And to clarify for the naysayers. The ISP includes the installation.

Isn't XO a sauce?

If I could get it for close to the same price we're paying for DSL, I'd jump in with both feet. Reality in the US kinda sucks at the moment.

@Minion-Queen said in Office 365 "Oops" Stories:

@BRRABill said in Office 365 "Oops" Stories:

@Minion-Queen said

Hence we when we do this one we actually migrate the data to 365 and 2 you don't delete the server for months until you are sure everything is where is should be and working correctly.

Shoot I have a room of servers here from upgrades ... just in case.

I'd have backups of backups before trying something like that.

Just ... because comptuers

YES!!! Yeah no such luck there. No backups at all. Except for I think one user who had put crashplan or something on their machine cause they were paranoid (I think there might have been good reason).

I'm not sure "paranoid" would apply to those users.

@MattSpeller said in How this IT Team Became Heroes:

Isn't it an iron clad rule that there are no heros in IT?

There was that great thread on SW years ago, I wish that I had the link, where there were hundreds of responses to "who is your IT hero" and not one, literally, not a single one, mentioned someone who worked in IT except for one...and the thing that made him their hero wasn't his IT work but his writing and not his writing about IT but his writing about time management. Zero IT people made the list. All marketing, sales or software people... and one writer.

We sell Carrier Services and usually size based more on the number of calls not the number of people. 30 simultaenous calls should be easy on any good (read: true business class) Internet circuit. @scottalanmiller has the bandwidth nailed on the head above. We di try and get users to get the best Upstream bandwidth which for cable modem installs around here is very difficult (Time Warner only offers 5Meg UP even in Business Class which is pathetic).
For our needs internally we needed well over 100 simultaneous call paths. We went with a dedicated circuit to a Rochester based cough carrier cough and a backup trunk over an Internet circuit. While bandwith has never been an issue lets just say I can't wait for the contract for the cough carrier to expire so that we can port and go to the Internet for our needs and dump them!

@RamblingBiped said in Podcast: Defending Against SIP Hackers:

Wow, this is kind of right along the lines of what I've been researching on remote extensions...

One of the things that we routinely do is to block all non-free calling so even if our extension, PBX or platform were to be hacked, even if they gained access to our SIP trunk, they can't rack up long distance calls or whatever.