Cisco 1000 Series Connected Grid Routers (CGR 1000)

In our organization, we primarily use the Cisco 1000 Series Connected Grid Routers program to improve the efficiency and reliability of our electrical grid. This product addresses business issues involved with network data management, infrastructure stability, and improving performance in capable networking spaces. Its scope of use extends to remote monitoring and control of connected devices, energy management and real-time data collection to make informed choices. It has helped us increase reliability, which is something important to us and is something that we had to improve and in this way it also allows us to reduce downtime.

A router is a networking device that forwards data packets between computer networks. Routers perform the traffic directing functions on the Internet. ... A packet is typically forwarded from one router to another router through the networks that constitute an internetwork until it reaches its destination node. We use Cisco to connect our three remote offices using WAN technology. We have put some basic routes on the router to enable failover when a WAN link is down.

The Cisco devices we purchased work well with out HP switches and work well with our Fortinet firewall, which was a big consideration when we made the purchase. While some Cisco proprietary protocols offer more funtionality, they do offer industry standard protocols that can be used to increase compatibility with other vendors products.

We have used ACLs (access controls lists) to bot allow and block network traffic. We also use their security products to secure our VPV traffic as well as their end point scanning on our wireless networks. The peace of mind these added layers of security offer makes it easier to work on projects without always worrying about security breaches.

Cisco Routers are top notch when it comes to data access. Their throughput speeds are amazing and they can be configured for high availability/fault tolerant operations. These access solutions are reliable from small office use to enterprise solution providers. Data access is definitely one of Cisco's strong points, with security being a close second.