Cisco Or MikroTik, Whichever One You Actually Need
We configure both. Routers, switches, VLANs, NAT and access lists on the Cisco side, RouterOS, firewall rules, DHCP and hotspot on the MikroTik side, and the VPN that ties your sites together afterwards. Done remotely, on the equipment you already have or the equipment we help you choose.
A small office is often quoted for a network built to a brand rather than to its own requirements. Sometimes a sixty dollar box does the job the enterprise proposal was written for, and sometimes it genuinely will not cope and the proper kit is the honest answer. Knowing which of those you are looking at is the whole value of the first conversation.
Everything We Configure
Six areas, all done remotely, on new equipment or on whatever is already in the rack. Most jobs touch two or three of these rather than all six, and the first conversation is mostly about working out which ones your situation needs.
Routers, Switches And Everything On Them
Built from scratch or cleaned up after whoever had it last. VLANs and trunking, NAT at the internet edge, access lists written so the next person can read them, and routing whether that means a few static entries or OSPF running across several sites. The configuration gets documented while it is being written rather than reconstructed later from memory.
RouterOS Set Up To Suit Your Network
The full RouterOS side through Winbox. Firewall and NAT, DHCP, DNS, queues for shaping traffic, hotspot with vouchers where you want guest access you actually control, and dynamic DNS so the box stays reachable when the address changes. These are capable far past what they cost, and most of their awkward reputation comes from defaults that suit no particular network.
The Parts Underneath Everything Else
VLAN segmentation that separates what should be separate, DHCP with reservations that make sense, internal DNS that resolves before queries leave the building, NAT, and routing either static or dynamic. These decide whether the network is quiet or whether Mondays get spent chasing address conflicts and printers that moved.
Tunnels Between Sites And For People Working Away
IPsec between offices, OpenVPN or WireGuard for staff on the road, and L2TP where the devices you already own leave you no choice. PPTP gets configured only when legacy equipment gives no alternative, and you will be told plainly that it should not be carrying anything you would mind other people reading.
Firewall Rules And Hardening
Rules built on a default of deny with the exceptions written down and explained, management access taken off the public internet, admin services moved off the ports everyone scans, and rules inherited from a previous engineer removed rather than quietly kept. The job starts with a look at what is currently exposed, before anything gets changed.
Packet Tracer And GNS3 Builds
Topologies built to match what you are studying for CCNA or CCNP, with the configuration explained rather than handed over as a file that works and teaches nothing. Also useful outside study, for testing a change against a copy of your topology before it goes anywhere near the live network.
If You Are Not Sure Which Of Those You Need
Describe what you have and what is not working, and that is enough to start. Plenty of enquiries arrive as a symptom rather than a specification, a branch that keeps dropping, wifi that dies at eleven every morning, a firewall somebody configured years ago and left. Working out which of the six areas above is actually involved is part of the job, not something you have to get right before you write.
Work is done remotely over AnyDesk or TeamViewer while you watch if you want to, and smaller jobs are usually finished the same day rather than scheduled into next week.
How Much Router You Actually Need
A sixty dollar box runs a twenty person office perfectly well, and it is the wrong answer for a warehouse with forty cameras. The gap between those two situations is where most of the money gets wasted, in both directions, so here is the line we use.
When The Cheap Box Wins
- One site, roughly thirty people or fewer, on a single internet connection.
- A handful of VLANs, DHCP, internal DNS and normal internet traffic.
- One or two site to site tunnels, or a few staff connecting in from outside.
- Guest wifi you want separated from the working network, with a hotspot page.
- A branch that mainly needs a reliable tunnel back to head office.
- Anything you are building to learn on, which is most of the lab work we do.
When It Is Worth The Bigger Platform
- A support contract is required by your insurer, your auditor or a customer's security review.
- You need hardware replaced next business day rather than ordered from a supplier.
- Deep inspection or content filtering at speeds a small processor cannot sustain.
- Lots of switch ports, power over ethernet for phones and cameras, or stacking.
- Redundant devices with automatic failover, where an outage costs more than the pair of firewalls did.
- An in house team who already know one vendor's command line and will inherit this after we leave.
The Option That Rarely Gets Quoted
Buy two of the cheap boxes and keep the second one in a drawer, configured and ready. For a small business that is often better value than a support contract, because a spare sitting on your own shelf is a fifteen minute swap at any hour, while a next business day contract is exactly what it says on a Friday evening. We keep a copy of the configuration either way, so restoring onto the spare is a file rather than an afternoon.
We do not sell hardware and take nothing from either choice. If your quote genuinely reflects what the site needs, we will say so and you can spend the money with confidence rather than wondering, which is worth more than the second opinion cost you.
How A Job Runs
Four stages, all remote, and you can watch the whole thing if you want to. Small jobs are usually finished the same day. Anything that touches a live office gets a window agreed first, because the risk on these is never the configuration, it is the timing.
You Describe It However You Can
A list of model numbers, a photo of the cabinet, an export from the router, or a sentence about what stopped working. Any of those is a starting point. You are not expected to arrive with a network diagram, and working out what is actually in the rack is part of what you are paying for.
We Look Before Anything Changes
Read access or a configuration export is enough at this stage. You get told what we found, what needs doing, and what it will cost, before a single line is altered. On a lab build this is the point where the topology gets agreed instead, so you are not paying for a network that turns out to be the wrong exercise.
The Work Happens In An Agreed Window
Over AnyDesk or TeamViewer, with you on the call if you prefer. The existing configuration gets saved first so there is always a way back, and changes go in one at a time rather than as a single large edit that has to be unpicked if something behaves unexpectedly.
You Keep The Configuration And The Reasoning
The finished config, a plain note of what changed and why, and the passwords in your possession rather than ours. If a different engineer picks it up next year they can read what was done without calling us, which is the point. Questions after handover are answered without a new invoice appearing for them.
Extras, If You Want Them
Added to any job, priced separately so you only pay for what you use.
- Remote support session over AnyDesk or TeamViewer $10
- Custom lab built for CCNA or CCNP study $20
- Advanced firewall rule design $15
- Domain and dynamic DNS configuration $15
Main configuration work is quoted per job once we have seen what is involved, since a single router and a five site network are not the same piece of work.
Tell Us What You Have And What It Needs To Do
Model numbers if you know them, a photo of the cabinet if you do not, and a line about what is failing or what you are trying to build. You get our reading of it and a price before anything is touched, and if the equipment you already own is fine as it is, that is what you will be told.
Talk about your network