What areas does Atreides IT serve?
Atreides IT is based in La Grange Park, Illinois and serves businesses across Chicago's western suburbs — including La Grange, Brookfield, Riverside, Western Springs, Countryside, Hinsdale, Westchester, Berwyn, Oak Brook, Downers Grove, and Elmhurst. On-site work is generally within about a 25-mile radius of La Grange Park. Managed IT and help desk clients can be supported remotely anywhere in the United States.
What size businesses do you work with?
Our typical client is a 5 to 50 person business — professional offices, medical and dental practices, retail, contractors, property managers, and multi-family buildings. We also handle residential networking and camera work in the same service area.
Businesses under about five employees are usually a better fit for project work — a network build, a camera install, a cleanup — than for a monthly managed contract.
Is Atreides IT a registered business?
Yes. Atreides IT LLC is an Illinois limited liability company in good standing, registered with the Illinois Secretary of State and the Illinois Department of Revenue. Formation documents and tax registration are available on request.
Do you subcontract the cabling and camera work?
No. Structured cabling, camera installation, and network deployment are done in-house. One company designs the system, pulls the wire, configures the gear, and supports it afterward — so there is no finger-pointing between vendors when something breaks.
How much does managed IT support cost?
Managed IT is billed per user, per month — not hourly. Our standard rate is $125 per user per month, with a $600 monthly minimum. A ten-person office runs about $1,250 a month.
That covers 24/7 monitoring, help desk and remote support, patch management, managed endpoint security, email and identity protection, backup with tested restores, and IT planning. Hourly billing punishes you for calling and punishes us for being fast, so we don't use it for ongoing work.
How much does a security camera system cost?
Camera projects are quoted at a fixed price after a site walk. Mounting and commissioning runs $125 per camera in labor, plus hardware. A typical six-camera small office with a recorder, cabling, and configuration lands in the $4,500 to $6,500 range installed.
The number of cameras is driven by blind spots, not by a package tier. We map coverage during the walkthrough and tell you where you actually need eyes.
How much does network cabling cost per drop?
Cat6 data drops run $135 to $275 each depending on difficulty — open ceiling and short runs at the low end, finished walls, conduit, or long runs at the high end. Rack and patch panel builds are $600 per rack. Door access installations are $450 per door.
Drop counts always come from an actual site walk, never from a floor plan, because floor plans hide the hard runs.
Do you charge for the initial assessment?
No. The first visit is a free 60-minute network and security assessment. We walk your space, check Wi-Fi coverage, network gear, camera coverage and blind spots, backups, and password and access hygiene — then give you a one-page written summary of what we'd fix and what it would cost. No obligation and no pressure to sign anything.
Do you require a long-term contract?
Managed IT agreements are month-to-month after an initial onboarding period. If we stop earning the relationship, you should be able to leave — and you keep your documentation and your credentials either way.
How fast do you respond when something breaks?
Remote support for managed clients starts within one business hour for normal issues and immediately for anything that stops the business — a down network, a server outage, or a suspected security incident. On-site response for clients in the western suburbs is typically same day, because we are fifteen to twenty minutes from most of them.
What cybersecurity is included with managed IT?
Every managed client gets multi-factor authentication enforced everywhere, Microsoft 365 hardening, SPF, DKIM and DMARC email authentication, managed endpoint detection and response, backup with restores that are actually tested, a password manager rollout, patch management, documented offboarding, and phishing awareness training.
That list is not an upsell tier. It is the baseline, because it covers roughly ninety percent of what actually happens to small businesses and it is what cyber insurance carriers now ask about at renewal.
Can you help us pass our cyber insurance questionnaire?
Yes, and it is one of the most common reasons businesses call us. Insurers now require multi-factor authentication, managed endpoint detection, tested backups, and security awareness training before they will renew a policy at a reasonable rate. We can walk the questionnaire with you, tell you honestly which answers are currently "no," and fix the gaps.
What happens when we switch from our current IT provider?
Onboarding starts with documentation and backup, not with ripping anything out. We inventory every device, account, and license, verify that your data is backed up before we touch a single machine, take over administrative access cleanly, and only then start improving things. Nothing gets replaced in week one just because we would have built it differently.
What equipment brands do you install?
We standardize on Ubiquiti UniFi for networking, Wi-Fi, surveillance, and door access, because one platform for all four means one interface to support and consistent parts across clients. For endpoints and cloud we work in both Microsoft 365 and macOS environments with modern mobile device management. If you already own gear that works, we will keep it — replacing working hardware to suit a vendor preference is not a plan.
Do you support both Windows and Mac?
Yes. Both are fully supported, including managed endpoint security and mobile device management on each platform. Mixed environments are normal and we do not charge extra for them.
What is AI workflow automation, and does my business need it?
It means finding the repetitive work your team does by hand — document sorting, data entry, routine email replies, scheduling, recurring reports — and building an automated version of it. We look at how your business actually runs, identify where AI genuinely saves hours, and set it up with training so your team can use it.
Most small businesses do not need an AI strategy. They need two or three specific tasks automated. We start there.
How do we get started?
Call 708-407-9132 or send a message through the contact page. We will schedule the free 60-minute assessment, walk your space, and give you a written one-page summary of what we would fix and what it would cost. Most clients start with one project and move to a managed agreement later.