Resilience should always be a key consideration when planning a system deployment no matter what the application is. Part of this equation is ensuring you have a disaster recovery plan but the other side is to consider how you set things up in the first place. Business critical systems over the years have developed and changed. For example, a solid and reliable internet connection is now essential for a business to operate. The same goes for a business communication platform. However, not all business owners or administrators have the time or expertise to set up a resilient platform.
Resilience cost considerations
Server hardware has reduced in price over the years but there is still quite a lot of technical experience needed in order to set it up. Added to that, if there isn't sufficient in-house technical knowledge then outsourcing the setup will be required. A savvy business owner is 100% right to have resilience in mind but in the real world, many will push it to one side due to all the costs involved. So is that the end of the discussion? No, there is another option.
Hosted by 3CX makes resilience easy
How great would it be to have a fully managed solution that you can get set up in no time, with minimal technical knowledge? Enter Hosted by 3CX! Available in over 50 countries, 3CX Hosted provides an outstanding way for you to free up your time, resources, and precious funds, to focus on other aspects of your business. 3CX’s hosted service is primarily provided by DigitalOcean which has 15 data centers worldwide and hosts over 78 million computing instances. Their SLA time is 99.99%.
Included in the service, we take nightly backups of your system so that in the event of any issue with your instance, we can spin up a new one in no time so that you are up and running as soon as possible. These backups are encrypted and stored securely. More on resilience in a second but before that, let's highlight what else is provided with our hosted offering.
What else is included with the service?
Nightly configuration backups are a great way to make sure that you are covered in the event of any issues. However, those backups must also be backed up with some sort of management. If you opt for a hosted solution, we will also provide you with the following.
- We deploy your instance to the closest data center in your region.
- We manage the operating system, including security patches and version upgrades (i.e. from Debian 10 to Debian 11).
- We keep your 3CX on the latest non-beta update.
- We monitor your 3CX system 24/7 including
- Monitoring of the data center.
- SIP trunk availability.
- Connectivity of any SBCs
- Usage of system resources and services incl
- Uptime reachability
- CPU
- RAM
- Disc space
- Steal
- Clock skew
- Duplicated machines
- Wrong size machines
- SSH unreachable machines
- 3CX Services
What if the virtual machine crashes?
This is where Hosted by 3CX comes into its own. You are completely hands off and we sort it all for you. As we monitor all data centers and instances 24/7, you can be sure we are on the case. If the virtual machine crashes, our support team gets an alert so we can then check it live. In the rare event that a machine is corrupted or non-recoverable, we can spin up a new one using the latest backup taken from the previous night.
What is and isn't included with the support provided?
What we will support:
- Issues deploying the service via the Customer Portal.
- Connectivity issues to/from the service (excluding STUN IP-Phones).
- Issues relating to 3CX FQDNs, 3CX SMTP Service, and 3CX Video Conferencing.
- Investigate any crashes on the system.
- On customer request, restoration to a previous restore point (backup).
- Patch management.
- Requests to terminate a hosted instance.
- OS management.
What we do not support:
- General configuration of 3CX such as extensions and CRM integration.
- Provisioning and operation of SIP Trunks.
- Configuration and management of IP Phones.
Sounds good? Then let's go.
If having a fully hosted, resilient, and monitored 3CX system sounds like it ticks all your boxes, then let's make it official. New customers can sign up for 3CX and either opt for 3CX StartUP or your own dedicated hosted instance. If you are an existing customer, sign in to your customer portal account and simply click “Switch to Hosted” under “Systems” and follow the wizard steps. Check out the manual for more information on how to migrate.
