The price of Ethernet local-area network (LAN) switches has dropped significantly in recent years.

As a result, migrating from 10 megabits per second (mbps) shared Ethernet hubs to 10/100/1000 mbps Fast Ethernet switches has become affordable for small businesses, which now can realize a dramatic network performance boost at an attractive price.

After you choose your LAN switching solution, it's on to deployment. Here are three principal steps to follow in making the hub-to-switch upgrade.

1. Forecast your bandwidth requirements.

You'll need to know how much bandwidth your users will need. To get an estimate, project how many desktop ports you expect to have 12 months from now, then add in a few extra ports as a buffer. This estimate will indicate the number of 10/100 Ethernet ports to buy.

2. Check network wiring and interface cards.

Remember, Fast Ethernet or Gigabit Ethernet require Category 5 (or equivalent fiber) cabling.

3. Install switches.

Give BTS a call we can get this done with minimal down time (in most cases 5-15 minutes)

With your intelligent switches in place, you can immediately start benefiting from the performance, availability, security, Quality of Service, and scalability benefits of LAN switching.