|
Client Corner In this section we will be highlighting our various clients. We like to help those who help us! If you are interested in sharing your company with the rest of our clients send us a note at mtbw@mtbw.com.
Feel free to send us items of interest that we can share or refer a product or excellent service you’ve encountered lately. Newsletter contributions can be e-mailed to mtbw@mtbw.com. Be sure to put the words “client corner” in the subject line. Thank you! |
|
Fortigate Firewall – We wanted a device to scan all incoming traffic for viruses before entering our network. There are a number of devices available for this purpose but MTBW recommended we try the Fortigate. They brought a demo unit in, configured it for our network, and let us try it for 30 days. At the end of our trial we reviewed the threats coming in to our company and frankly we were shocked at the results. On an average day we had over 20 attempts for unauthorized access, over 30 incoming viruses, and over 10 attempts to reach web sites we considered to be offensive. While the statistics mentioned above were enough to sell us on the product, the functions of Network Intrusion Detection, Anti-Virus Protection, Web Filtering, VPN connectivity, Log Files, and report options all built into one device for a very reasonable price, made the Fortigate the obvious choice. Barracuda Spam Filter – It may be a perception but when the National and State “Do Not Call” lists went into effect we began to see a significant increase in email spam. Again we turned to MTBW to see what they suggested and again they brought in a demo unit for 30 days. This time it did not require 30 days to see the results. The effects were immediate and substantial: We receive an average of 2900 emails daily. The first week in operation we eliminated 52% of email messages, because they were classified as SPAM. After using the Barracuda for 9 months we have been able to reduce total email flow by 78%. The Barracuda has detected and prevented well over 98 percent of all SPAM messages. This device can be configured to accept or deny email by Domain Name, Sender Name, IP address, Recipient Name, Attachment Type, Header Content, Subject Content, and Body Content. It contains a statistics page for monitoring hardware performance and traffic flow while being very cost effective. Being a small company, we have limited resources but MTBW has shown us how to compare down time against the cost of having backup resources. Each year MTBW reviews our network with us and looks for “Single Points of Failure”. Having backup units for these “SPF’s” has greatly reduced the amount of down time we experience when (not if) a critical network component fails. Knowing this is going into an MTBW news letter makes all this sound like I’m on their sales staff but I speak as a systems administrator who wears many hats and has dealt with many consultant firms, hardware, and software suppliers. The most important factor to me when choosing a business partner is to know that partner has my back when I need help and is willing to do what it takes to get an issue resolved. This is where MTBW shines above all others. On more than one occasion we have had a problem after normal business hours. I have been able to speak to a MTBW representative and if the issue could not be resolved remotely they have them come to our location - that is outstanding service. |