After working on networking and computer systems for so many years, the companies that provide consistent quality support for their products are on a short list indeed. Although working on Microsoft products for many year as a given, I've haven't had the experience of using their tech support (remote tech support or otherwise). I have used the support services of many other major and smaller companies with the everyday household name on the list for sure.

Names and their server and desktop support services from companies like Dell, HP (server, desktop, and printer), IBM, BlackBox, Cisco, etc.. One of the most consistent, reliable product support services experienced has been from Adtran.

Adtran has evolved from a csu/dsu company, providing ISP and customer premises equipment, to manufacturing and successfully making inroads into routing and network switching, VPN gear, and other computing and networking hardware. Their product support for both pre-sales and post sales has been fantastic and worth noting as probably one of the best programs in the industry (my opinion of course).

Year after year their support remains consistently of very good quality. They are commited to this and it shows. If good product technical support is a reason for selecting networking hardware, then Adtran should be considered when it's time to purchase gear. Here is the best and most surprising part of this story, they don't charge per year for by making you purchase a support plan. Cisco, for example, has been ripping customers off for years with their Smartnet program. Maybe because their products are so buggy, just a guess. Adtran support their products not for 30 or 90 days after purchase but year after year without having to purchase tech support contracts.

Remote Support Software

If there was a short-coming to web based remote support, it would be that while supporting servers and desktops through the web provides for greater speed to getting to problems fast, sounds and lights of the system are left out.
Web based remote support is a great tool indeed but while working on servers beyond a configuration problem or other generic issue, hearing the drives and seeing the flicker of light at various points of troubleshooting some problems really helps. Web based remote support software leaves out this type on input for obvious reasons, they can't be translated easily onto the screen.
Even more expensive web based desktop remote support software products that have online desktop support functionality can't provide those added support tools. Products like Microsoft's LiveMeeting or Cisco's MeetingPlace, as expensive and feature rich they may be, don't provide a visual representation of the hard-drive read and writes or the status of LED light indicators from the front panel of the server of desktop system that's being diagnosed for software or hardware problems.




All the years I've called for technical support from Adtran, they've never used remote support.
They have accessed an internet facing router on occasion using remote access. The remote access wasn't using remote PC access, but rather via a direct connection to the router through the Internet. Adtran's support only needed to open a web browser on their end and connect to the router using the web Interface. That type of remote support is great and very useful tech support but there's one disadvantage for the on-site tech, they are unable to see the same screens that the remote tech support representative is viewing. Although this will work in getting the problem resolved (and many times that's all that's needed), as far as learning, it's not as advantageous as seeing what's being done (and Adtran's tech support is very good at explaining the technologies in use and the steps they are taking to implement them). They may have a software package for supporting remotely via remote desktop support, but I've just not had the experience of seeing it in use (maybe that's a good thing too as it means I haven't screwed up the equipment too badly :) ).

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