How to Check if Internet is Down in Your Area?

There's a website called Down Detector, which provides real-time monitoring of Internet issues and network outages in your area. It lets us know if there are any services that are down in the area or any services that are not available online.

For example, if your kids jump onto Xbox Live or whatever it might be, you can jump on that website. It will tell you if Netflix is down in the area or down globally or whatever the catchment area is of how far that spread goes. It also shows different providers. Maybe Telstra is down or maybe Optus is down. You can click on it and select your area. You can view a map and see whether it's just you and no one else is having Internet issues or there's a huge spike in the number of people that are reporting the same problem with that telco.

Down Detector is a handy website to be able to work out what's going on, and whether or not there are Internet issues in the area. It will help you make sure that you didn't just have too many winos the night before that resulted in you accidentally kicking the cord out of the router or unplugging something by accident.

It gives you a bit more insight into the Internet issues before you jump on the blower and drop some dosh on an IT guy or some other service that you might have to pay for to bring it up and running. You don't want to be on the phone talking to those people on hold for a long time and finding out that it's just your cord—not a network outage in the area—and you feel like an idiot.

Instead, go to Down Detector and you'll at least know if it's just your Internet connection having issues or if it's a bigger fault that you probably can't do anything about. It's still good to report it.

Use Your Phone to Check Network Outages in Your Area:

You might be wondering, 'But Josh, my Internet is down. How do I go to the website?'

Very good question. I'm glad you asked. And the answer to that is hopefully if your mobile phone's down, you still have an Internet connection that you can use: at home, your landline, or your partner's phone. If you're experiencing Internet issues—your landline Internet connection, your NVN or ADSL service, is down—hopefully, you can jump on your phone. If not, think outside the box. Take a 50/50, phone a friend, and see what they say when they go to the website and look up your area.

The Final Word 

During the storm season in southeast Queensland, we experience more Internet issues and network outages in the area. Down Detector is an invaluable tool for you guys to jump on and check out.

If you're having constant problems with your business internet service plan, talk to a dork. We can help!

4 Benefits Of Professional Web Hosting For Businesses

Every business needs an online presence – a pivotal element of which is creating a website. Yet, the process is not as straightforward as many may think. Before you can wonder about the perfect web design, you must first worry about which web hosting platform to use. In today’s world, you need a professional web hosting plan that can keep up with your website.

You might not realize it, but professional web hosting is a thriving business in itself.

1. Improved Site Performance:

Optimum site performance is immensely important for a business. Take these alarming statistics into account. To best retain visitors to your website, you must make a point of reducing the instances of glitches and lags. One way to do so is via working on your web design. For instance, you can create a clean and minimalistic design to boost page speed.

Apart from this, your professional web hosting provider also helps in improving the performance of your website. Quality providers work on providing a high load speed, regardless of the contents of the website.

2. Unlimited Bandwidth:

Free web hosting services allow website providers only with a fixed about of space and bandwidth. In layman’s terms, only a given number of people will be able to visit your website at a given time. Similarly, you will only be able to have a limited amount of data on your site.

One of the best advantages that a professional web hosting service provides is that it allows brands to have space and bandwidth, as per the requirement of your business. This means that you can choose a package that best suits your need, as per the stage of growth you are at.

For instance, while low bandwidth and space might be ideal for you when you are a startup, owing to the affordable price of such packages, with increasing traffic, you will be able to upgrade your website to sustain more visitors.

3. Enhanced Security:

Having a secure website is crucial for a lot of reasons. This includes:

(i)  For securing customer data.

(ii) For maintaining brand image.

(iii) For boosting consumer trust with the brand.

Using a professional web hosting provider allows businesses to access a variety of robust security privileges. 

4. High Uptime:

When searching for the best provider, the chances are that you came across the word “high uptime” quite a lot in comparative analysis.

First, let’s begin by understanding what this word means. You might have gotten messages from your bank about their website going down for maintenance, right? How frequently that occurs depends on the uptime of the web host.

Uptime refers to the frequency of your site’s ability to go online. All web hosts offer a given percentage as to how much your site will go online. The remaining time (when the site is not online) is allocated to system updates, repair, and maintenance.

All professional web companies offer an immensely high uptime – some to the extent of 99.5 percent! So, this is an advantage you will surely enjoy if you select the right provider.