Uplink traffic and bandwidth upgrade

[phanlawi]

Our office is currently using Video conferencing heavily and we often have issues with video/audio quality (freeze, no sound and so on). The internet bandwidth is 100 Mbps (local/inter), Security device is MX100. users is around 100 people but client devices are at 300 - 350.

From uplink traffic, during working hours the average uplink traffic is at 75 to 90 Mb/s.

So my question is, if we are going to upgrade the internet bandwidth, what is the minimum bandwidth to get and Is MX100 good enought to support the office.

Many thanks for your all time suggestion and support.

[CptnCrnch]

Looking at https://meraki.cisco.com/lib/pdf/meraki_whitepaper_mx_sizing_guide.pdf fthe MX100 should be able to push up to 750 MBit (650 MBit with all security features enabled).

[ww]

Its also important  to prioritize the voip and video  traffic and maybe  even limit per user bandwidth if you have limited  bandwidth. 

[cmr]

@phanlawi is the current 100Mb bandwidth on a 100Mb bearer or a 1Gb bearer?  If it is on a 1Gb bearer and the ISP you use is able to manage simple soft changes then you have two options:

1) calculate the max number of concurrent video streams going externally and multiply by the bandwidth used.  Upgrade to this amount, it might be more than you need though.

2) add 50Mb, change the WAN port settings on the MX100 to reflect the change and monitor the improvements, if some but not enough then add again.  This will ensure you don't overbuy.

We use MXs for our SD-WAN and I can confirm that the MX100s will pass at least 500Mb of traffic from ~200 devices without overloading so you shouldn't need a hardware upgrade unless you plan to go much higher.  The 750Mb limit mentioned by @CptnCrnch is a hard limit.

[cmr]

Sorry, forgot to add that if you have a 100Mb bearer and cannot get a soft upgrade then I'd start with 200Mb on a 1Gb bearer for a new circuit but make sure they give you a copper port or copper gbic as 1Gb bearers often terminate as fibre with an SFP port.

[KarstenI]

I would say that the MX100 is pretty fine for the next upgrade(s). We have an MX84 on a 1Gig connection. Obvious we can not use the whole 1Gig, but up to around 500 MBit all is running smooth.

(The Upgrade from the previous 200MBit to 1Gig was nearly the same price as the Upgrade to 500MBit and a new firewall was not in the budget yet.)