The musings of an IT Consultant » small business

Cisco AP541N Access Points

Raj Perumal — Mon, 30 May 2011 03:59:27 +0000

Hi folks! So for those of you that want to use cheap wireless and 802.11n, there aren’t many options unless you want to go with really low end product.

Well Cisco is now offering small business access points that do just that. The new AP541N access points support 802.11n and are a perfect fit for the small business environment.

If you require more than what this offers you can always move up to a controller based solution, however for most small businesses these access points would do just fine.

You can read more about them here.

-RP

Microsoft Security Essentials

Raj Perumal — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 03:38:04 +0000

Hi folks! So more often than not, I hear a lot of people ask about what they should do for anti-virus at home. They are concerned about it, but at the same time they don’t want to pay for it.

Well for you home users and small businesses out there, Microsoft has a solution for you. It’s called Microsoft Security Essentials. It’s Microsoft’s answer to anti-virus and it comes free of charge for home use. What’s really nice is Microsoft also allows you to use it in a small business on up to 10 computers.

What’s the down side? Well it’s not centrally managed and it’s feature set is quite limited compared to pay-for commercial products. However if you are going to make the choice between no protection, and some protection, you might as well try out Microsoft Security Essentials. I have used it in many environments and while not the best product out there, it’s not bad either!

-RP

Great small business firewall from Cisco

Raj Perumal — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 20:26:16 +0000

So as a result of Cisco getting more and more into the small business world, they have finally decided to position a small business firewall in the market for the smallest of small businesses. The Cisco SA 500 series of security appliances. This is from the Cisco Small Business Pro line.

The Cisco SA 500 series comes in a variety of models, the SA 520, 520W and 540. The 520W is particularly nice because it provides built-in wireless functionality as well. The 540 is basically the version that supports the most throughput and is the higher end version of the bunch.

From using the SA 520, it is apparent from the start that it is meant to be user friendly. The entire device is configured via the GUI and there is no command line to worry aobut. If you just need a small appliance to drop into a very small business for basic Internet access and firewalling capability, this is a great solution. On top of all that it has VPN and VLAN support so you can do some business-like configuration of the device instead of just throwing in a home based router/firewall.

-RP