Your Server Probably Doesn’t Need to be Replaced

What? A network support company (Microsoft Gold Partner, at that) is telling you not to spend money upgrading your Small Business Server or Exchange Server? Yep!

Being the smart business person that I am, I understand that $100 in the stock market today is going to be worth a lot more in a few years. [It has to go up, right?] Why spend that $100 today to replace your Small Business Server or Exchange Server, when you can wait a year or two and do it for less money?

First, Determine WHY you are Upgrading

This week, I headed to a consultation with a new prospect. I started the process just like I do everytime, “Yes, I understand that you are looking at installing Windows 2008 Server and Exchange Server 2007 on a killer new server, but what is it that you are REALLY trying to accomplish?”

Generally, I have to frame the question a few times, before I get to the root of the problem.

This time, it was related to space on the Exchange Server, more than anything else. He has a 150GB drive for Exchange, and it has 5GB free. The company has only 35 people using the server right now, so I knew there was:  1) a bunch of packrats saving WAY too much email, or  2) something was wrong with their backup system.

Exchange not Backing Up Properly = Lots of Wasted Space

If Exchange isn’t backing up properly, log files will begin to accumulate in the log directory. If you haven’t changed Exchange from its default, your log directory and your database directory are the same. Take a look in your directory and sort the information by ‘date modified’… the oldest at the top. If you are in the right place, you’ll notice the ‘E00000XXXX.log files’ in the directory.  If any of those files are older, than when your last full Exchange Server backup should have been, it’s not working. [see below]

OK, How Bad is it?

• Pretty Bad – You’re wasting hard drive space
• Really Bad – You may not be able to restore Exchange Server

Some people argue (usually, unsuccessfully) that they are doing an image-based backup of the server, and therefore , they are getting Exchange server as well. There is some truth to that, however Exchange keeps data in RAM, and unless something is using VSS, or another system to pause the database while the image occurs, you may not be getting all the data. Also, this still doesn’t help you free up space.

Another 3 Months and Prevented an “oh s**t!” Moment

I told the client, the first chance he got, be sure to backup his database using NTBackup. That ensures that :

1. He will have a solid backup.
2. He will have some additional space.

I apologized for the lack of sleep he will be getting, until he is able to complete the backup.

Next, he needs to look at why Acronis for Exchange wasn’t working properly. We’ll help him with that, if he needs it.

Finally, now that we have more time, we’ll spend a little more of it planning out his future upgrade… much better than,  “I think I have a week’s worth of space available. I have to do it now”.

A Second Opinion is a Beautiful Thing

Before your next big upgrade, please give us a call. We may be able to buy you some time and/or save you some money.

Telephone: 561-491-5750

Email: sales@DedicatedIT.com

Or for immediate help, Chat with a Solutions Expert

Washington Post: Mexico Raises Swine Flu Death Toll to 149

MEXICO CITY, April 27 — The suspected death toll from the outbreak of swine flu in Mexico rose Monday to 149 people as health authorities canceled all schools across the country until May 6.

The anxiety over the virus has vastly altered the rhythm of Mexico City, with millions of people staying home and many of those who venture out doing so wearing masks. On Sunday, Catholic Masses across the city were canceled. One of the most popular Mexican professional soccer teams played a game in an empty stadium that can seat more than 100,000 people. Mayor Marcelo Ebrard said he might have to shut down all public transportation if the crisis worsens.

Is your company ready for a pandemic?

A 2007 survey of 215 CIOs, chief security officers and IT managers found only 35% had plans in place to deal with pandemics like the Swine Flu hitting Mexico (and parts of the U.S.)

76% of companies would allow telecommuting

• Allow employees to work from home (76%)
• Use their current business continuity/disaster recovery plans (72%)
• Geographically disperse their operations (38%)
• Outsource their operations (13%)

Battle plans seldom survive the first bullet

An IT employee answered the “Is Your Company Ready?” question posed by Computer World by writing,

NO, IT is not very ready for this. In my workplace, there were rumblings about “planning” when the Avian flu was in the news several years ago. These included squishy emails on how we were supposed to go out and get ourselves set up for work at home, but no subsequent instructions OR support for this. Then it was forgotten.

When was the last time you saw a blue tarp?

We Floridians know how hard it is to keep our hurricane plans up to date, even though we’ve experienced plenty of storms in the last decade. Focusing on a pandemic is even harder, because we haven’t faced one since 1918. Our whole culture has changed, so the old models don’t fit. In 1918, we were primarily an agrarian society, and few women worked outside the home.

Pandemics and Hurricanes: Prepare for one level higher than predicted

We were at Pandemic Level 3 (few human infections) when I started writing this. The World Health Organization just raised the Pandemic Alert Level to 4 (Sustained Human to Human transmission), below Phases 5 and 6: “Widespread Human Infection.”

Craig Fugate, former Florida emergency management director and Obama-appointed FEMA administrator, said that he always planned for a storm one category higher than what was predicted.

“If it looks like it’s strengthening, it probably is,” he said. “It’s probably a layman’s way of looking at it, but the computer models haven’t improved.”

What would happen if 25 to 40% of your workers didn’t or couldn’t get to work?

Unlike hurricanes and earthquakes which destroy buildings, pandemics impact humans: your workers, your vendors, their families, the daycare they depend on, the guy in the Brown Truck that makes your deliveries, the guy who pumps your gas and the refinery worker who provides it to him.

Even if your employees aren’t sick, they may have to care for others who are. They may be quarantined. They may be afraid to come to work. They may not be able to get gas; public transit may be curtailed.

What can you do to prepare NOW?

An Australian site has some good suggestions.

• Share critical information/filing and general knowledge management.
• Share passwords/keys to critical information sources.
• Identify backup personnel (2 or 3) for key positions.
• Plan in advance how you will scale down your operations at various absenteeism levels, and at what point you will suspend operations.
• Conduct exercises to see how staff loss affects your business. (Normal cold season is a good time to test this. If a person sneezes or coughs, send them home and see how it impacts your operation.)

What can you do to minimize the spread of disease?

• Telecommuting should be allowed for as many staff as possible.
• Meetings are kept to a minimum, and then in the largest rooms possible, with people sitting at least three feet apart. Consider holding meetings outside, or open windows to increase ventilation.
• Workplace mixing should be kept to a minimum, using natural barriers or organizational units to keep staff segregated.
• Encourage use of stairs, and decrease the number of people allowed in elevators.
• A “one meter distance rule” between staff (and customers where possible) should be maintained.

We’re going to allow employees to work from home. What should we think about?

• If you send your employees home, are their home computers prepared to allow them to perform 100% (or close) of their job?
• If everybody is stuck at home and using the Internet for work, information and entertainment, the internet service providers may not be able to keep up with the demand.

[Shameless plug: Citrix Application Virtualization takes less than 20-25% of the bandwidth of a VPN connection, and it won't propagate viruses from unchecked home computers. Your office VPN link may be capable of handling three simultaneous connections, but 30? Even if the Internet link to your home has the bandwidth, your office connection may be bottlenecked.]

• Consider wireless cards for your laptops to backup DSL/Cable connections. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket: buy connectivity from multiple vendors for redundancy. TEST the connections where you think you’ll use them. Coverage areas vary.
• Sign up (or reimburse) your key employees for business-level service with their ISP. Commercial accounts get faster speeds and (allegedly) enhanced support. If ISPs have to throttle back service, they may hit consumer accounts first.
• Don’t wait until the last minute to test your system. Have your employees try to connect from home while you have the time for handholding. You’re going to be busy enough with other problems in the midst of a disaster.

If you’re depending on outsourced companies, ask them some tough questions.

• What happens if they lose commercial power?
• If they have a generator, how many days can they run without being resupplied? Do they have alternate suppliers lined up?
• What is their pandemic (or other disaster) plan for continued service, if 25-40% of their  employees don’t show up?
• How are they going to support me, if they can’t travel because of quarantines or other restrictions?

Remote Offices Powered by Citrix XenApp and Microsoft OCS

When I read advisories like these, no matter how precautionary they are, it makes me very comfortable knowing that my employees will not be exposed unnecessarily. My entire staff can (and does) work from home.

How do we do it?

Currently, we use a mix of Citrix XenApp, Microsoft Office Communication Server (OCS), Microsoft SQL Server,  Microsoft Exchange Server and a blend of Cisco/Asterisks to provide Voice over IP service. Our employees have full capabilities no matter where they are, as long as they have an Internet connection.

Our remote office expert consulting team and some of these technologies are available as part of our free network upgrade promotion.

To learn how we can help your business, please contact us:

Telephone: 561-491-5750

Email: sales@DedicatedIT.com

Or for immediate help, Chat with a Solutions Expert

Remote Office Experts

Back in February of 2009, I posted a blog entry (The Remote Office – Eating Our Own Dog Food) about our business moving from a centralized office to everyone working from home. There were three primary reasons for this decision:

• Why incur the  cost associated with maintaining an office that, generally, no clients ever saw?
• Why make our guys come into an office, if we can make it work otherwise?
• We wanted to ‘eat our own dog food’. We sell this remote stuff, why not use it ourselves?

We have survived a few months working remotely. This article is about our communication improvements as a result of the transition.

Real-time Communication is Key with any Remote Office

One of the biggest things, that we knew we had to overcome before moving out of our office, was finding how to replace the the different types of in-person communication that we had throughout the day.

• Eye contact – You could look at someone and tell whether he was on the phone and, generally, how much longer he thought he would be.
• The drop by – With all of our desks within walking distance, it was no big deal to walk over and interrupt someone’s day if he didn’t look busy.
• Gathering around a monitor – Often, the guys would find a new utility, a funny video or they needed help with something they were troubleshooting. Having everyone near each other made this easy.
• Whiteboard/notes – If someone was on the phone, it was typical to write a quick note and hold it up and get a nod for either yes or no.
• “Love taps” – We had these little yellow foam golf balls and other projectiles in our office. It was standard operating procedure to send one over to an unsuspecting co-worker just for fun.

While seemingly very small, eye contact and “love taps” enabled us to be a quick-moving team that really understood and cared about each other.

How would we replace these? Or should we, in some cases?

Microsoft Office Communication Server (OCS)

We determined that a chat system would be the most likely candidate for replacing these types of communication. We investigated a few different chat systems and determined that we wanted something that was internally hosted and had enterprise features.

Microsoft Office Communications server fit the bill for us.

• Person-to-person and group-based instant messaging
• Complete integration with Outlook
• Presence – Available, Away, Do Not Disturb, Offline and Out of Office
• Desktop sharing with individuals and groups
• Video streaming for face-to-face communications

[It also doesn't hurt that we are a Microsoft partner and get the majority of the licenses for free.]

Microsoft OCS Makes us Better

New whiz-bang technology is great and all, but unless it makes a business better, it’s just an expensive toy. Microsoft Office Communications Server makes our business better. The biggest change I noticed is the way our team responds to company-wide issues for our clients.

Pre-Collaboration Wide-Spread Event:

Previously, all of our help desk phones would begin ringing, and we all would have our heads down focused on that one person on the phone. The higher-level engineers would realize that it could be a wide-spread problem, but they couldn’t get in touch with the other people on the desk, because they were focused on their own call. An email would be sent, but if just one person doesn’t reply-all, the communication forks and some staff members end up losing critical information.

Post Collaboration Wide-Spread Event:

When a wide-spread issue is taking place, that same lead engineer now starts up a group chat with all technicians [three clicks]. This way all communication is done in real-time and captured in a single place. If for some reason, one technician feels that seeing his/her screen would help, a single click publishes that person’s desktop to all of the people in the group chat. Amazing!

Microsoft Outlook Integration and OCS

Another feature, that I really love, is the integration between Outlook and Microsoft OCS. The two biggies are:

Out of Office status with message

I leave the “office” pretty regularily to meet with prospects and clients (want a meeting? – contact me), and I always want my team to know where I am. When I update my out of office message, it will automatically set my status to ‘Out of Office’ (displayed with a red dot) and put my out of office message next to my name. Immediately, my team can see that I’m out – because of the red dot – and where  am just by hovering the mouse over my name.

Ability to reply to an email with an instant message

If you receive an email from anyone in your organization, there is a little dot next to the sender’s name with his current status. This not only allows you to see whether they are available for chat, out of the office, or away just briefly, but also allows you to respond to the email with a chat instead of a standard reply. [shown in the image above]

This is a huge time saver. How many times have you had one of your email threads accumulate 15 replies and take 30 minutes to complete? Instant messaging, directly from email, quickly put an end to that.

Did we Replace all of the Communication Methods, above?

• Eye contact – Mostly replaced by the status indicators. Next step: integrating our phones into it so we can see whether you are on the phone or not.
• The drop by – Gone and hopefully never replaced. What a time waster!
• Gathering around a monitor – Replaced by desktop sharing. Faster, and allows remote people to participate even if they are at client sites.
• Whiteboard/notes – Replaced by instant messages. And, groups of people can be involved, now.
• “Love taps” – This one is hard to replace, although I’ve started to see a trend of sending YouTube videos to each other unannounced and without saying what’s in them (for instance: Video1 or Video2 – both clean) or some clever banter in a group chat window for no reason.

No, we haven’t, replaced all the communication methods, but we’re getting closer. And, I think we have improved, as a service organization, because of the communication methods we have implemented.

Although, I really do miss launching little yellow foam golf balls around the office.

DedicatedIT Coordinates the Donation of Servers and Networking Equipment

Recently, the South Florida Science Museum got a much needed donation from DedicatedIT and one of its long-time clients, Dickerson Florida of Fort Pierce.

A while back, DedicatedIT replaced some servers in its hosted environment to add capacity, improve performance and increase redundancy. A very powerful, yet non-virtualizable, HP Proliant server was donated to the museum.

Also, recently, Dickerson Florida upgraded their network to support server virtualization, using Citrix XenServer. Again, the HP Proliant servers were unable to support virtualization, but were still very powerful servers. Dickerson donated two HP servers and an LTO tape backup system.

“The new servers come at the perfect time”, said Jeff Gourdouze the Operations Manager at the South Florida Science Museum. The museum is currently seeing membership increase and has need for more advanced computing services like video and collaboration.

The Museum Builds Network Experts

I grew up in the local neighborhood and benefited from a annual family pass when I was a kid. I rode my bike to the museum often.

My favorite thing in that place is still there today. It is a shadow wall where, when you push a button, a flash goes off and your shadow is stuck on the wall behind you. I don’t know how much time I spent in there trying to perfect the perfect pose.

I went on a lot of field trips and other events at the museum as well. I really think this was the start of my becoming the nerd that I am today.

The Idea Behind the Xtreme Network Makeover

Seeing the impact that slightly used equipment made to a non-profit like the South Florida Science Museum really made me think about what a whole new network could do for a disadvantaged business or non-profit.

So, I set my sights on the ability to give one away for free. I asked Scott Maulsby, my General Manager, to get involved, and he called all of our partners and vendors. They came through in a big way.

Read about it here where we are giving away a whole network.

Network Support

There are two types of IT people: those who have devoted their lives to IT and are really, really good, and those who know just enough to be dangerous and made the mistake of letting someone know it.

The second category is the topic of this article. This person is usually an office manager or a legal assistant who inherited the position of in-house IT person by accident. Or, in a far-fetched, “we needed a great headline” scenario, it could be an alligator wrestler.

(If you just want to know the solution and don’t want the supporting evidence, skip down to the section called “Plan for Your Computer Network“)

Sure, These People Could Provide Network Support

You’d like to enter telephone numbers as 10 digits in your spreadsheet, but have them show up as (561) 555-1212. Peggy in Accounting knows you can do that by setting your cell formatting to Special/Phone number. That saves you four keystrokes per entry and makes sure the data is all entered the same way.

You need to send out press releases to 300 addresses, but don’t want the recipients to see everyone it was sent to. You’ve already sent 40 individual emails when Joyce walks by and asks, “Why don’t you create a group list, then put the addresses in the Bcc: field? You can send all 300 (260 of them, now) at one time and the addresses will be hidden.”

Sam knows how to clear the jam in the laser printer.

Dave from AC knows just where to hit the vending machine to cause two bags of potato chips to fall. (Oops, wasn’t supposed to mention that.)

All of these folks have little snippets of knowledge that they’ve learned, either from trial and error, or from training.

Your business is at serious risk, though, if you count on Peggy, Sam, Joyce and Dave (especially Dave) to safeguard your data, make sure security patches are up to date and to seal off all the ways the bad guys can break into your network.

Encouraging your unofficial office gurus to help out with applications may be good for morale and helpful for productivity, but don’t assume that being able to make a spreadsheet look pretty qualifies someone to run the network on which your livelihood depends.

Companies who make the decision use an ‘Accidental’ IT person are being very short-sighted. They are trading lower, predictable operational expenses in the present for, what could be, extraordinarily staggering expenses in the future.

Perception is NOT Always Reality

Don’t get me wrong, the Accidental IT person may do a very good job of handling the little IT-related things that pop up each day.

Day-to-day Network Support

Doing those things is very important for your day-to-day business. I liken them to being able to jump-start your car when the battery is dead and filling up the water for the windshield washer, but never getting your oil changed nor checking the tread depth on your tires.

If you’ve appointed one or had one appoint himself, (and you know who you are), ask your Accidental IT person these questions, and see if you like the answers:

Q1: When was the last time you reviewed the event logs on the server to see if there is anything that needs to be proactively done?
a) I checked them today, and there was an Exchange eventlog 9688 error message. I’m going to up the limit and restart the Exchange datastore tonight so that we don’t hit the limit tomorrow and crash.
b) Where are the event logs?
c) The only time that I ever look at the event logs is when something has gone wrong and my friend’s, husband’s, nephew says to look in the system section.

Q2: Today, I read that tapes for tape backup drives should not be kept in use for longer than one year, because of data reliability issues. When was the last time that we replaced the tapes?
a) I’ve been using a pencil to spin the tape while holding a wet paper towel on the magnetic strip. My friend’s, husband’s, nephew told me you can get a couple more months out of them.
b) That’s right. I had a note on my monitor to order those. Yikes! That was January. I’ll order them today.
c) I replaced them last week with a few days to spare.

(answers are at the bottom)

A Plan for Your Computer Network

FIRST: Hire an IT services company that specializes in small business computer networks, and ask them to perform a network assessment for you. Have them provide you with an example of assessment report they’ve done for another company. If it’s detailed, has few grammatical errors and has logical explanations for each recommendation, hire them. Rates are generally somewhere between $600 for a 1/2 day and $1000 for a full day. Remember, you get what you pay for; you may want to pass on an offer to do it for free.

SECOND: Immediately, act on all items that are associated to data loss or security concerns. If the experience with the assessing firm felt good, have them perform the work. Otherwise, get three proposals and take care of these issues ASAP.

THIRD: Once you find a solid computer networking company, have them put you on a monthly maintenance plan (our industry calls these Managed Services). At the very least, look for a company that installs software on all of your network devices and monitors those systems 24×7. They will alert you if there is an event that needs action taken. Even if you aren’t a 24×7 shop, the ability to monitor 24×7 says something about the company’s ability to deliver.

Want to allow your Accidental IT person to get back to the job he/she was hired to do? Look for a company that has a fully-staffed help desk and a contract that offers unlimited remote support, in addition to the monitoring.

FOURTH: Pick up that assessment and read it. Really read it. Work with the above company to put together a long-term plan (that includes prioritization, budget and time frames) for handling all of the issues from your assessment. Remember, because of the unlimited remote service contract, it benefits both companies to remedy your problems, so ask them to cut you a break on the implementation services rate.

FIFTH: Enjoy a reliable network that causes you fewer headaches. You will sleep better knowing that maintaining your network went from unexpected, jaw-dropping expenses to budgeted and predictable expenses.

After all, a butcher can trim a brisket, but you don’t want him doing brain surgery on you. Both activities use the same basic tools, but there’s a big difference between the butcher’s and the brain surgeon’s knowledge and experience.

(By the way, the answers were 1A, 2C)

I LOVE HP Servers

I’ve been using them since they were Compaq servers. HP has kept the servers and the parts that they use consistent enough, that you know what you need without doing a lot of research. And, if you do have to do research, their QuickSpecs datasheets on their servers are amazing. Very rarely do we ever order the wrong part for an HP server.

The Proliant G5 Series was Truly Amazing

The Proliant G5 Series was a stellar series of servers. It was the first generation of HP servers that included Intel’s processor with VT. That feature alone sold more servers for us than any other feature during 2008. Why? Because it was the first chip that supported our primary virtualization technology, Citrix XenServer. In order to virtualize on an HP platform, you needed a Proliant G5 series server. Period.

The HP Proliant DL360 G5 also had a pretty impressive feature with respect to hard drives;  it allowed for as many as six SAS drives. The G4 version only allowed two.

So, What’s New with the G6 Series?

If you want to read yourself to sleep, here is HP’s official Proliant G6 Website.

Here are the highlights:

• Intel’s new Xeon 5500 CPUs
• Power efficiency and cooling
• Shared power supplied across all G6 models

I planned to write a huge explanation of what was awesome. However, Scott Lowe did a great job on his blog. Why reinvent the wheel?

Take note of the section on the RAM slowing down as more is added. That’s something I never knew:

‘Among other things, QPI provides higher memory bandwidth—but how much higher depends on the amount of memory installed. That’s right: the more memory you install in the server, the slower your memory speed will be. This is a “dirty little secret” that many server vendors don’t want to disclose.’

Network Management and Monitoring Service

I was searching Google to look for competitors for a new network management and server monitoring website that we’re launching soon. Somehow through my travels, I ended up on a blog that had a happy Friday post with this video in it.

I watched the WHOLE thing.

And, I have to admit, even though this week felt a little longer than most, I’m smiling. Happy Friday!

Network Assessment

Speaking of being happy, how about treating your network to a network assessment? It’s the quickest way to determine whether your network is happy or needs some TLC. We’ll come to your South Florida office and look over everything to help you spot small problems before they become business-closing, data-loss-creating disasters.

On April 8th 2009 at noon EST, after nearly six years without a serious network outage, DedicatedIT experienced a complete failure of our NetApp storage system. Our storage system is less than six months old, and is considered to be one of the best brands of storage systems in the industry. Because of the redundancy built into these systems, it is very unlikely to have a catastrophic failure like we experienced today. No data was lost.

Our techs were dispatched to our data center immediately, and NetApp priority technical support worked with them all day to restore service.

Replacement parts were delivered within two hours of the outage, but they did not fix the problem. A replacement storage system was delivered late in the evening and all data was migrated to the new system. That restored all services.

As an added precaution, a third storage system will be delivered Thursday.

I understand your frustration and know the impact this type of outage has on your business. This event brought down not only your business, but ours as well.

Our team will be reviewing our system over the next week and will determine how to mitigate this risk in the future. I will report back to you, as soon as a solid design is in place. I’ll be happy to explain, in as much detail as you would like,  what happened, what we did to fix the problem and what we are going to do to keep it from happening again.

While this type of event can happen to any business using any man-made system, it is humbling and embarrassing to have it happen to us. I apologize.

Please contact me to discuss further.

Adam Steinhoff
President/CEO
DedicatedIT – a division of Steinhoff Consulting, Inc.
Direct: (561) 491-5725
Email: asteinhoff@DedicatedIT.com
Twitter: @adamsteinhoff

Old: Throw Bandwidth at it. It’s Cheap!

Back in the days when new customers were easy to find and cash flow was plenty, a lot of businesses “fixed” problems the easy way… by spending money. One of the places that businesses did this was on Internet and remote office connections.

When staff members started to complain that the network was slow, the telephone company or Internet provider was called and additional capacity was added. We’ve seen companies with less than 15 people have a $2000/month, 10Mb Metro Ethernet. Crazy!

New: You Probably Don’t Need All That Bandwidth

The fact of the matter is that most people (including those on your IT staff) have NO CLUE how much you really need and what it is being used for at any given time. Ask them these questions and watch for the blank stare.

• Are we using all of the bandwidth that is allocated from our ISP, or can we reduce it?
• Who in our company uses the most bandwidth? Can it be reduced? If so, how?
• If you look at our web traffic, what categories of sites are being visited most?

Don’t be too disappointed when they can’t provide you with the answers. Chances are that they don’t have the tools in place to answer these questions, because they have never been asked.

First: Call Your Phone Company Today

Have them analyze your usage over the last 30 days. They will be able to tell you whether you are using all of your bandwidth or not. If you aren’t using all of your allocated bandwidth, ask them to reduce it to a more adequate level.

If they tell you that you are maxing out the bandwidth, here is where the hunt for dollars really begins.

The Case for Network Monitoring Tools

While you want to allow your employees the freedom to check their personal email or jump onto Facebook a couple of times a day, you really don’t want them watching live streaming video or using peer-to-peer file sharing applications. These applications can (and will) utilize 100% of your bandwidth all the time, which means that your business-related activities will never perform properly. Talk about a waste of money!

Misconfigurations, like having all  systems individually going out to the Internet for updates, is another drain on bandwidth. Proper network design is to have a single system go out for the update, and then all other systems collect the update from the first system. Again, another waste of money if not configured properly.

Proper network monitoring can capture data about your usage, allow you to run reports and find costly problems like these. End result: recurring monthly savings.

There are Easy-to-use Tools to Help

There are a boatloads of tools on the Internet to help determine what is using your bandwidth and whether it is legit or not (over 1400 on download.com as of this writing). Most of them require a rocket scientist to install and configure, and then an advanced degree just to read the reports.

If you have or are an IT person, download this free network monitor tool.

Contact us if you don’t have an IT person on staff,  or if you would prefer a more detailed bandwidth consultation.

Telephone: 561-491-5725

Email: sales@DedicatedIT.com

Or for immediate help, Chat with a Solutions Expert

Plug-and-Play and Wizards Make Most Things Easier

Over the years, computer technology, software and networks have become more user friendly… more intuitive, more robust and just easier for people to use. Overall, this is a very good thing for most computer users. For example, before USB, you’d have to know about IRQs, memory addresses and other low-level things in order to make any new device work on your computer. Want a new hard drive installed, now? Just plug it into the USB port, and you’re off to the races.

Even program installations and configuration have become much simpler. Last night, I started the download for the free version of AVG for a friend and didn’t want to wait for it to complete. My friend asked, “what do I need to do to get this done?”.

The answer was “next, next, next, finish”.

Until There are Problems

Unfortunately, making things that simple can be a bit of a double edged sword – especially if/when something does go wrong or breaks. Because people are no longer required to understand what IRQs, memory addresess, drivers and directory paths are, it makes it very difficult for them to troubleshoot their problems on their own.

• Why is my Outlook not connecting all of a sudden?
• Why is my network drive telling me I don’t have rights anymore?
• Why is my display different today?
• How come the letter on my external hard drive is different today?

Unless you grew up in the days of DOS and hardware-level settings, you probably don’t know where to start with these issues.

“HELP! My Outlook Data is Gone.”

A perfect example of this is the case of a client who “lost all of her email” just a few weeks ago. This client utilizes her Microsoft Office applications within a Citrix environment. As most people who manage Citrix environments know, profiles (user personal settings) don’t always load properly. This morning was no different for this particular client.

In an attempt to correct the problem herself, she reset her Outlook archive to a local archive. Then, after completing an archive of her email, she logged out of Citrix.

Naturally, her local archive file did not return, because she was using a temporary user profile. This prompted the EMERGENCY call into our helpdesk, and I began to untangle the mess.

It took quite a bit of time to restore her email without going to the backup from the previous night, which would have cost her day’s email correspondence.

We Know You Were Just Trying To Help, But….

There’s old adage that says a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Just as a precaution, be sure that you truly know the consequences of what you are doing. The above client could have saved both of us about an hour, if she had just picked up the phone and called her helpdesk at the first sign of “strangeness”.

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