Support
suh-pŏhrt: 1. to sustain under trial or affliction. 2. to uphold by aid, countenance.
We like problem solving, and we’ve become pretty good at it. In fact, we have a few logical systems that can be used to troubleshoot virtually anything.
What We Do
- Telecommunications Technical Support - (aka TelecomSupport) consulting services for POTS, such as the GTD-5® and 5ESS® switching systems, networks ATM, VoIP and other packet technologies, and just about any system with electrical hardware and/or software design components.
- Network Technical Support - for TCP/IP and OSI data networks, VPN, firewalls, IPSec encryption, etc. for Cisco® and Nortel® technologies.
- Surveillance System System - Gathering real-time telemetry, monitoring and dispatching, security and data for various proprietary systems.
- Data Back-up - We help you build critical, survivable systems for data such as RAID's, rings, and multiple geographic locations.
- Asset Management - We will help you ensure that necessary back-up equipment, parts and tools are ready to go, so they are available when and where you need them.
How We Do It
- Telephone, video, email and on-site technical support - we provide telecommunications consulting by whichever means is available or makes the most sense for you. For on-site support, we can often get to your premises on very short notice with minimal hassle.
- Training of your personnel - with theoretical and real-world training, at your own premises so costs remain low.
- Performing audits or root cause analysis (RCA) - to determine why serious problems occurred, and to bullet-proof your system to prevent problems from happening again.
The real skill in providing quality technical support is how one goes about fixing a problem -- any problem. It could be electrical, mechanical, logical, modular, or described by any other number of criteria. The problem could be abstract, direct, or latent, and it may or may not be visible or verifiable. But if one can devise a flexible and thorough system of troubleshooting, perhaps using several methods which each have their own strengths, and use patience and attention to detail, it is possible to fix virtually any problem.
AG Advice and Support has terrific strengths in these areas. For example, our personnel have been responsible for emergency troubleshooting of several complex communications systems for military and civilian purposes, including POTS telecommunications, data networks, radio and video, where the service of many thousands of customers was at stake. We specialize as a hard-to-find GTD-5 consultant, and have managed the turn-up of three GTD-5® base-unit installations, where we audited modules of unknown nature, engineered a customized site configuration, then installed the modules to bring-up working switch complexes, to Telcordia specification, and with zero faults. We have helped the hospitality industry recognize problems that numerous hotel inspections failed to reveal. We have also found clients who were familiar and comfortable with their back-up systems, emergency plans or security, only to find several material deficiencies. Through it all, we use risk management principles to help evaluate probabilities, cost, and complexities of implementing preventative measures to keep equipment reliable in the future, and not just for the day it is handed over.
Many real-world examples of our assistance are given throughout this website, under the Technical, Marketing and Operations pages. Also, we provide a link to our Logic Primer® which gives many examples of basic yet powerful troubleshooting and applied-thinking techniques.
How would you like to "think" today? That's probably not a question you get asked everyday. It's interesting, but there's a whole science to thinking about how we think. If you would like to see a few of these different thinking and problem-solving techniques, have a look at our Logic Primer™.