Technology News and Progent IT Solutions

Cisco introduced innovative solutions intended specifically for small business networks and engineered to deliver a high degree of security and collaboration for an affordable cost. Products introduced by Cisco included the Cisco Spam and Virus Blocker, the Cisco NSS2000 and NSS3000 Network Storage Systems, and the 1.4 version of Cisco's Smart Business Communications System.

The Cisco Spam Blocker is a dedicated spam, virus, and phishing filter security product that virtually eradicates email-based threats right out of the box. The Cisco NSS2000 and NSS3000 Small Business Network Storage Systems are affordable desktop network-attached storage appliances that provide security for valuable information and enable employees to access shared files effortlessly. The Cisco Smart Business Communications System (SBCS) Release 1.4, a complete collaboration and communications system that easily connects sites, employees, and clients however dispersed. Cisco's current release incorporates the industry's first cordless desktop VoIP handset with Bluetooth support. To see Cisco's press release, visit Cisco Announces Networking Products for Small Companies.

Cisco Spam Blocker
The Spam Blocker protects small companies by offering extensive defense against junk mail, viruses and other email threats to secure your system and business information while improve productivity. Because the product stops spam with minimal set up and stays current on its own, it eliminates the cost and time associated setup and continuing and management. By eliminating unwanted email, Cisco's Spam and Virus Blocker increases the performance of network connections, servers, and computers. The Spam Blocker appliance represents an end-to-end defense against email threats by featuring a physical appliance, intelligent software, ongoing updates, and technical assistance in a unified bundle.

Key features of the Spam and Virus Blocker include:

• Accuracy: Helps to make sure that email-borne threats and spam are caught and business email is delivered.
• Continuous automatic updates: Constant interaction with SenderBase services, an online library of email safety risks, ensures that the Spam & Virus Blocker appliance incorporates the most current patches to guard your business email.
• Simple installation and use: Easy-to-use browser-based installation wizards permit you to configure the Spam and Virus Blocker in practically any environment in 15 minutes, delivering instant protection for your business network.
• Streamlined administration: As soon as you installs the Cisco's Spam and Virus Blocker, you benefit from spam and virus protection with no extra effort demanded of your network support group.

Cisco NSS2000 and 3000
The Cisco Small Business NSS2000 and NSS3000 provide the dependable protection and comprehensive data backup features that your company needs, at a price small businesses can handle. The Cisco NSS3000 accommodates as much as to four terabytes of data and as many as 15 simultaneous users on each chassis, offering the optimal solution for holding, accessing, and archiving your vital business data. As distinct from ordinary NAS systems, the NSS3000 provides the state-of-the-art backup, encryption, client validation, and fault tolerance your organization needs.

The Cisco NSS3000 4-Bay Gigabit Storage System enclosure handles any certified hard disk drive. It provides a range of features in a desktop-size system designed specifically for small businesses. The Cisco NSS3000 Storage System enclosure also gives you the flexibility to configure the system without any connected hard disk drives, to reconfigure it at any time, and to chain several Cisco NAS chassis together, providing a platform that can smoothly expand with your company.

Your business can use the Cisco Small Business NSS2000 or NSS3000 to:

• Automatically back up vital data from each PC and server in your business
• Provide unified storage and distribution of important files
• Run Continuous Data Protection to back up automatically each version of every file saved by workers, permitting your business to recover files with ease
• Record and save video from your company's video surveillance system

Smart Business Communications System
The Cisco Smart Business Communications System Version 1.4 is an easy-to-manage and comprehensive collaboration and communications system that allows small businesses to interconnect at-home workers, on-the-road workers and employees in disparate sites to improve their ability to communicate with customers and teammates. In Release 1.4, the aggressively priced solution has enhanced wireless capabilities including the first wireless desktop IP phone with built-in Bluetooth, the Cisco SPA525G VoIP phone, which enables businesses to grow easily by deploying phones in locations where conventional phone lines or network cables are not present or cannot conveniently be added.

Other new components of the Smart Business Communications System Release 1.4 include:

• Cisco's 520 Secure Router to help guard a small business network and provide employees safe connectivity to the Internet and important corporate information wherever they are
• The Cisco Configuration Assistant v. 1.9 to allow partners to simplify the configuration and installation of solutions designed custom for certain businesses

How Progent's Consulting Professionals Can Assist You to Take Advantage of Cisco Networking Technology
Progent's Cisco certified support professionals and CCIE accredited networking experts can assist you to assess new Cisco products to determine their appropriateness for your IT system, deploy Cisco appliances to enhance the protection and performance of your network, and provide tech support for Cisco products both onsite and online to keep your IT network operating dependably. Progent's IT professionals offer a range of cost-effective technical services to improve the availability, safety, performance, and manageability of your company's information network:

Immediate Access to Cisco CCIE Network Engineers
Progent is the leading source of convenient, quick, and cost-effective assistance from Cisco CCIE engineers. Cisco Certified Internetwork Experts are elite network experts who earn this top-level classification only as a result of strenuous examination by Cisco. CCIEs are able to handle even the most complex problems associated with IT network design, configuration, repair, and service. Progent’s CCIE professionals cooperate closely with Cisco in-house staff in identifying issues with Cisco's IOS software and finding workarounds or acquiring patches to resolve anomalies. Progent offers quick access to a CCIE by telephone so that you are able to get emergency assistance for tough network problems that are undermining business efficiency but are beyond the expertise of your local IT support providers. Progent's CCIE support professionals can link to your network via advanced off-site support tools in order to deliver fast and cost-effective diagnosis and repair of critical infrastructure problems.

Cisco Voice over IP Phone and IP Video Phone Solutions
Progent's Cisco VoIP phone and video IP phone experts can assist you to integrate, maintain, and troubleshoot Cisco VoIP phones, desktop video IP phones and wireless IP phones. Progent offers support for all models of Cisco's IP phones from discontinued Voice over IP products to the latest HD media phones. Progent's IP telephony experts can also assist your organization to integrate your IP phones with Cisco Unified CM, formerly named CallManager, or with Unified CM Express to build a modern IP-PBX environment for unified messaging and company-wide collaboration. Progent's consultants can deliver support with all aspects of Cisco VoIP Phone integration including designing dial plans, solving IP phone registration issues, configuring SIP gateways, installing ISR G2 routers with CUBE VoIP networking capability, and designing Cisco UCS server clustering and Cisco Survivable Remote Site Telephony (SRST) solutions for high availability. For more details concerning Progent's offerings for Cisco's collaboration solutions, see Cisco VoIP and Unified Communications Professional Support.

Cisco Unified Communications Manager and CallManager Unified Messaging
Cisco Unified Communications Manager, formerly named CallManager, functions as the core of Cisco's collaboration portfolio. CUCM and Unified CM Express provide an advanced IP-PBX solution by integrating tightly with unified messaging apps such as Unified Communications Manager IM and Presence Service, Cisco Unity Express (CUE) for voicemail, Mobile Connect for Single Number Reach, and Cisco Contact Center Express (Unified CCX or CCX) for building a highly automated customer contact center. Progent's CCIE-certified CUCM and CallManager consultants can help with any facet of CUCM configuration and troubleshooting in areas that include integrating Voice over IP phones and video IP phones, reviewing dial plans, configuring SIP trunking and PSTN support, installing Cisco ISR routers with CUBE support, designing Cisco UCS server failover systems for high availability, and integration with Exchange Server.

Cisco ASA Firewall and PIX Firewall Support
Progent’s experienced Cisco network security consultants provide high-level PIX Firewall and ASA Firewall engineering support covering infrastructure design, integration, and support of Cisco firewall and Cisco security solutions. The PIX and ASA Security Appliance Series of Cisco firewalls delivers robust user and software policy enforcement, mutlivector attack protection, and secure access services. Ranging from economical, easy-to-install desktop appliances for small and home businesses to modular gigabit appliances, Cisco PIX and ASA Firewalls offer a high level of security, high throughput, and high reliability for IT systems of any size. PIX Firewalls and ASA Firewalls are based on a proven, specially designed operating system, eliminating common OS-specific security gaps.

Security Inventory and Evaluation Packages
Progent's GIAC, CISA and CISM-premier security engineers can deliver a variety of budget-friendly network security Inventory packages and network security assessment packages created to offer organizations of all sizes a chance to get an impartial opinion about the quality of their security profile. These packages vary from low-cost external security scan and internal network security scan options for small and midsize companies up to a high-end network security evaluation solution for institutions who need comply with security standards demanded by state regulators or by vendors. For each security inventory or evaluation package, engineers with high-level security accreditations evaluate and summarize collected data and make recommendations for efficient remediation.

Cisco SIP Connectivity Solutions: SIP Trunks and Cisco CUBE Integration Consulting
Progent's Cisco-certified SIP infrastructure experts and CUBE integration experts can assist your business to design, integrate, manage, debug and enhance Cisco's SIP infrastructure technology and Cisco's CUBE (Cisco Unified Border Element)-connected IP PSTN trunks. Progent offers cost-effective remote or on-premises support to assist companies to move efficiently to an advanced communications environment that delivers fast ROI. Progent's Gold-certified Microsoft collaboration consultants can assist you to establish connections between Cisco's CUBE Session Border Controller and Microsoft's VoIP and IP video applications such as Skype for Business and Lync for connectivity to a SIP-based IP PSTN trunk.

Consulting and Support Consulting and Troubleshooting Services for Cisco Wireless Products
Progent can give you access to a certified CCIE or Cisco Certified Network Professional to assist you to develop a comprehensive wireless network design and implementation strategy that incorporates a broad array of wireless appliances and technologies and offers the identical protection, expandability, and manageability you demand from your wired network. Progent can assist you to achieve transparent integration between Cisco wireless products and wireless technology from other vendors to offer your business the features you need as well as the most secure, dependable, and economical wireless networking system possible. Progent's CISM, CISSP, and ISSAP security specialists can show you how to design protection into your WLAN and into your company's operations.

Simplified Management Solutions for Cisco-based Small Business Networks
Progent's Cisco-Certified network management engineers offer help with Cisco's management utilities along with a variety of powerful third-party applications to build a comprehensive network management solution in order to keep your environment running reliably, fully utilize limited resources, protect your data, recover rapidly from device breakdown or malicious assaults, and allow you to add or repurpose network resources intelligently and affordably as your company evolves.

To find out additional information concerning Progent's consulting and support services for Cisco networking and security technology, phone 1-800-993-9400 or refer to Contact Progent.