The 2N decision that sets everything else: where the system is administered
Almost every 2N project turns on one early choice. Are the intercoms and readers managed on site through 2N Access Commander, or through the My2N cloud platform? Settle that before hardware is ordered. It drives the network design, the firewall rules, who holds the administrator account, and how a Sunday afternoon lockout gets resolved. Changing course later means re-provisioning every device on the property.
Managed on site
Access Commander runs on the customer’s own infrastructure, as a virtual machine on existing hosts or on 2N’s appliance. Configuration, user records and credentials stay inside the building network. That fits a tenant in the data center corridor west of Atlanta, or any facility whose security policy forbids outbound connections from door hardware. The trade is ownership: somebody has to patch it, back it up, and keep the hypervisor healthy, and remote support needs a VPN path that exists before the first service call.
Managed in the cloud
My2N moves calling, credential issue, configuration and firmware handling to a hosted service. Devices reach out, so no inbound rules are needed. For a manager running several buildings around Cumberland and Perimeter, or student housing in Athens that turns over every August, issuing and revoking mobile credentials from one console matters more than local control. The consequence to plan for is that a circuit outage becomes an access event. Decide at each opening what happens when the link drops, and write it into the sequence of operation rather than discovering it in a storm.
Hardware follows the platform
2N, part of Axis Communications, splits entry hardware into three roles that bid sheets routinely blur together:
- Intercoms such as IP Style, IP Verso 2.0, IP Force, IP Solo and IP Base: a camera, speaker and call button at the door, behaving on the network as a SIP endpoint.
- Access Units, reader-only devices for openings that need a credential but no conversation.
- Answering points, meaning Indoor View, Indoor Compact, Indoor Talk and Indoor Touch, a desk phone, or a mobile app, depending on whether anyone is actually sitting at a desk.
Mobile entry uses 2N’s WaveKey Bluetooth method alongside RFID cards and PIN codes. Where a building already carries 125 kHz credentials and wants to move to 13.56 MHz, the reader version has to match the card population that is really in circulation. Count what people carry, not what the last purchase order says.
Power, pathway and Georgia weather
Each door station needs a network drop, and the larger touchscreen units draw enough that the switch has to supply PoE+ rather than standard PoE. Check the power budget against the finished station list, not against a sample of one. Locks and strikes are powered separately; the intercom commands a release, it does not energize the hardware.
Outdoor stations here earn their gaskets. Summer humidity condenses inside flush back boxes on shaded elevations, and afternoon thunderstorms put surges on any copper that leaves the building envelope toward a gate pedestal, a parking deck or a detached lobby. Bond and ground the run, fit surge protection where it enters the structure, and consider fiber for the longer exterior segments. Put the switch that feeds the entry devices on a UPS sized for the outage you actually get, not a nominal five minutes.
Settle these before the survey
- Which management platform, and who holds the administrator account after handover
- The existing credential technology and card format at every reader
- Where calls terminate: phone system, desk station, or mobile
- The intended behavior at each opening during a power or internet outage
Send the opening list and a description of what is installed now, and KSEDCO will work the platform question through with you before anything is priced. Reach the Cumberland Parkway office in Atlanta at (888) 360-0035 or through the contact page.
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