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R E V I E W

Teaming Up with the Right Management Service

July 24, 2003
By Bruce Boardman

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iNOC IMonitor

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	In this article
	Introduction
	Calculations
	PerformanceIT Network Management Service
	iNOC IMonitor
	HCL Technologies Intelligent Network Operations Services
	NetProactive Services Remote Infrastructure Management
	Scenario
	Complete Responses to RFI
	Cost Comparison: Chewing the Fat
	Weblinks
	Report Card Explained
	Report Card

The best MRC rates, low one-time costs and very good service-level management helped iNOC finish a very close second. It was hard to find fault with the Northbrook, Ill., MSP's proposal, with the exception of having to sign a three-year contract. This contract length may not sound excessive, but the other vendors offered one-year or month-to-month arrangements.

The iNOC response was short and to the point, yet quite detailed. The company didn't waste our time with fluff. We quickly saw that pricing was significantly better than that of the other participants--iNOC didn't mince words about the number of FTEs it would offset, offering its own cost analysis. We used the number of FTEs iNOC suggested, which was less aggressive than PerformanceIT's, but we applied our own salary and benefit numbers to maintain our comparison across vendors.

INOC supports the desired availability and transaction times in the stores with a couple of reasonable caveats: First, service for WAN circuit failures is dependent on the availability of the WAN provider. Second, the throughput goal of less than 2 seconds network time needs to be baselined prior to iNOC accepting responsibility. For this baseline, a one-time fee of $12,000 is charged. The one-time service initiation fee to convert to iNOC is $45,800, plus $12,000, for a total of $57,800 initiation.

TacDoh's PoS transactions were specified as a supported part of iNOC's coverage. In addition, it specified that it will manage the Ethernet switches, wireless access points and WAN CPE (customer premises equipment) and circuits in each of the stores. We expected this coverage from everyone, but NetProactive said it wouldn't offer this service, and HCL didn't address this in its response.

For our special gray-area trouble situations, iNOC impressed us with no on-site charges for NTF. Its reasoning, which we liked, was that if it diagnoses problems correctly these types of ghost resolutions will be kept to a minimum. If an on-site error turns out to be caused by a WAN service provider, iNOC reduces its normal $150-per-hour fee to $125.

INOC recommended installing terminal servers at each store to provide analog modem access and out-of-band management. It was the only service provider making this good suggestion and estimated the cost at between $8,000 and $15,000 per warehouse, for a total cost between $24,000 and $45,000 to purchase the equipment. In addition, analog lines would run between $17 and $23 per site per month.

Metrics monitored were very complete, including utilization and errors on links, and CPU on servers and routers. Five-minute samples rolled up weekly, monthly and quarterly would be available as part of iNOC's default offering, providing good performance reporting; PerformanceIT required that TacDoh have a database for the trending that iNOC provides. Trouble ticketing was, like the other vendors, online and real-time, with monthly summary reports.

IMonitor, iNOC, (877) 510-4662, (847) 714-9909, (608) 663-4555. www.InternetNOC.com