Many people know that reliability is a key advantage and feature of cloud fax solutions. However, few are aware that achieving reliability is highly dependent on the network architecture that supports an internet fax system. This blog post explores the important of active-active network architecture and its contribution to reliability for a solution like Concord Cloud Fax.
Learn how Active-Active Network Architecture for Enterprise Fax Systems is Key for eliminating potential service interruptions and maintaining business continuity – speak to a Cloud Fax Specialist.
Active-Active Architecture Is Critical for High-Volume Cloud Fax Solutions
The optimal network architecture for a cloud fax solution is a fully active-active, twice redundant model. This means that every logical element of the network is replicated within each datacenter as well as across datacenters, providing two separate layers of redundancy. To complement this structure, each datacenter is scaled to be capable of handling total peak traffic for the entire network at any one time. This capacity enables components (or even an entire datacenter) to be taken out of service with no service interruption and allows the majority of maintenance to be completed without any scheduled downtime.
The main purpose of an active-active architecture is to achieve high availability and load balancing. By enabling the Concord Fax network to route incoming and outgoing fax traffic to the target datacenter, guided by rules designed to achieve maximum throughput and minimum response times, this model directly supports Concord’s industry-leading call completion rates. In case a datacenter goes down temporarily, the active-active architecture automatically sends all traffic through the sister datacenter to avoid any service interruption. Most importantly, this happens automatically, without any human intervention or need to reroute fax numbers. There’s no impact to cloud fax service, and users are unaware anything occurred. By design, each datacenter has capacity to handle all traffic for the network, with additional excess buffer space, which eliminates any risk any possibility of service interruption, even at peak times.
Active-Passive Network Architecture Should Be Avoided
An alternate network structure used by some fax service providers and end-user organizations maintaining on-premise fax servers is active-passive network architecture. Less expensive to implement
and maintain, active-passive networks enable providers to link various datacenters together. This approach is particularly common amongst providers seeking cost-effective means to merge multiple disparate networks forced upon them through acquisitions.
Unfortunately, active-passive fax networks differ from active-active in that they are incapable of real-time multi-datacenter load-balancing and failover because they have only a single live instance operating at any one time. If a component becomes unavailable in an active-passive environment, the service provider must move each fax customer’s data to the failover (backup) server. A manual and frequently time-consuming process, this recovery effort can result in fax service interruptions of hours and even days. Even worse, upon regaining access to their service, users may find that access to historical faxes and metadata was not migrated to the new server during the failover process and is no longer available to them. For organizations using faxing within high volume workflows, even the smallest disruption can have a major negative impact on the operations. Avoiding the possibility of disruption is best.
Imagine the impact of a fax service disruption on your organization. Estimate the cost of a high-reliability Concord Cloud Fax solution based on your regular faxing volumes.
Learn how Active-Active Network Architecture for Enterprise Fax Systems is Key for eliminating potential service interruptions and maintaining business continuity – speak to a Cloud Fax Specialist.