Over the several years that we've been writing this column, a topic that we've revisited from time to time is how best to provide for backup for small branch offices and/or telecommuters. At one time, ISDN was recommended since it was a dial service that was relatively widely available. Of course, with the limited bandwidth of a Basic Rate Interface (BRI) connection at a maximum of 128Kbps, this option today is not much more attractive than dusting off the old 212a modem.

As a practical matter, we've often advocated using both cable modem and DSL services. The good news is that both are fast and relatively inexpensive. The rationale was that both also were so unreliable that you probably needed both to get to a reasonable level of uptime.

Today, we're going to look at an alternative. Simple fact is that both service types, cable modem and DSL, at least in our experience, have become much more reliable. However, we still feel that there is a need for backup.

For this backup service, our current choice is using a cellular data modem, especially in cases where the environment is such that a single computer is the primary backup. (We still see the jury as being out on "Internet Connection Sharing.")

The reasoning is pretty straight-forward. You don't get quite the throughput per dollar per month that you would with a fixed service, but you also aren't stuck with a solution that is fixed to a given location. So you get mobility with backup.

Steve has recently been trying this approach, and in the next newsletter we'll share some of the thought-processes that went into making this rather radical shift.

In the meantime, we’d love to hear how you’re providing backup service (if at all) for your remote workforce.

Steve Taylor is president of Distributed Networking Associates and publisher/editor-in-chief of Webtorials. Jim Metzler is vice president of Ashton, Metzler & Associates.