ProviNET’s Recommended Best Practices (MSP)

At ProviNET, we believe in clarity and precision. We work hand-in-hand with you to create a strategic IT roadmap based on our recommended best practices, helping you define your long-term IT objectives. With our strategic IT management, we don’t just promise enhanced value and productivity – we illustrate what these improvements entail. In order to obtain the best possible outcomes, ProviNET maintains these recommended best practices.

ProviNET’s Recommended Best Practices for the Managed Services Program

Network and Power Equipment

Firewall

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	SonicWALL Fortinet	Cisco Meraki Watchguard	ISP provided routers Consumer grade routers
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 5 years old	Greater than 5 years old
Subscriptions	Current Advanced Threat Protection Subscription	Current Advanced Threat Protection Subscription	Missing or Lapsed Advanced Threat Protection Subscription

Network Switches

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Aruba Cisco Meraki	Dell Extreme Fortinet HP Juniper Ruckus Ubiquiti	Consumer grade switches
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 7 years old	Greater than 7 years old
Speed	10/100/1000 Mbps or greater	10/100/1000 Mbps or greater	10/100 Mbps or less
Management	Fully managed	Fully managed	Unmanaged

WiFi Access Points

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Aruba Cisco Meraki Ruckus	Extreme Fortinet Juniper Xirrus Ubiquiti	Consumer Grade
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 5 years old	Greater than 5 years old
Management	Centralized Management and Monitoring Capabilities	Centralized Management and Monitoring Capabilities	No Centralized Management and Monitoring Capabilities

Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS)

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	APC Eaton	CyberPower Dell Emerson HP Liebert Tripp Lite	Consumer Grade
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 5 years old	Greater than 5 years old
Management	Network Management Card	Network Management Card	No Network Management Card

Servers and Applications

Server Hardware

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Dell	HP IBM Lenovo	Whitebox End User Assembled
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 5 years old	Greater than 5 years old
Warranty	Must be under Hardware Warranty from Manufacturer	Must be under Hardware Warranty from Manufacturer	No Hardware Warranty

Storage Area Network (SAN)

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Dell EMC PowerVault Dell EMC Unity	HPE MSA HPE Nimble Dell EqualLogic	Consumer Grade
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 5 years old	Greater than 5 years old
Warranty	Must be under Hardware Warranty from Manufacturer	Must be under Hardware Warranty from Manufacturer	No Hardware Warranty

Network Attached Storage (NAS)

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Synology	Buffalo QNAP	Consumer Grade
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 5 years old	Greater than 5 years old
Warranty	Under Hardware Warranty from Manufacturer	Under Hardware Warranty from Manufacturer	No Hardware Warranty

Operating System

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Microsoft	Microsoft	AS400 Linux
Version	Windows Server 2022 Windows Server 2019 Windows Server 2016	Windows Server 2012 * * On-premise thru 10/10/23, Azure thru 10/13/26	Operating System versions that have reached full end of support from Manufacturer
Licensing	CSP Enterprise Agreement Volume Licensing	OEM	Unlicensed

Hypervisor

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	VMware	Microsoft Hyper-V	Linux, Zen
Version	Supported version from Manufacturer	Supported version from Manufacturer	Greater than 5 years old

Backup and Disaster Recovery

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Datto Cove	Axcient Unitrends Veeam	Windows Backup External USB Drives
Version	Supported version from Manufacturer	Supported version from Manufacturer	No support from manufacturer
Miscellaneous	Must have immutable cloud storage	Must have immutable cloud storage	Local storage only

Line of Business Applications

Approved

Supported

Unsupported

Version

Supported version from manufacturer and be supported on approved
server/workstation operating systems

Supported version from manufacturer

Self-developed software

Software that is not compatible with installed OS

Warranty

Must have software maintenance and support contract

Desktop/Laptops

Server Hardware

	Approved	Supported	Unsupported
Manufacturers	Dell	HP Lenovo Apple	End User Assembled Retired workstations with unsupported OS Linux OS Machines not running Pro or Enterprise editions of OS
Age	Less than 5 years old	Less than 5 years old	Greater than 5 years old
Warranty	Recommended warranty for 3 years but not required for desktops/laptops. OS under active support by Microsoft.	Recommended warranty for 3 years but not required for desktops/laptops. OS under active support by manufacturer.