Welcome to the October issue of ICT Worldwide’s 5 Things business technology bulletin. As we get closer to the end of the year we’re hearing from organisations about the challenges they face in managing their IT and keeping the costs in check while reducing the risks to their business. This month’s 5 Things bulletin looks at some of the ways to deal with that from protecting your data and improving desktop performance through to making sure that IT works for your business not making your business focused on managing your systems.
We’ve had great feedback on our communication bulletins and our Lunch and Learn’s have gone well. Our aim is to of course work with organisations as their ICT partner, but part of this is to help them understand more about the technology and how it can be used, rather than try to push something onto them, as is the usual approach within IT. That just leads to businesses using products that aren’t necessarily suited to their needs, and creates a negative impression with business managers about the value of IT. Our latest Lunch and Learn on the use of Wireless in business and how it has evolved was very well received, with a really informative and interactive presentation that took into account what the organisations attending were currently facing and looking at how the new innovations in wireless, such as remote online management of wireless access points wherever they were located, could benefit their business and give them greater flexibility and control.
We hope that you find this bulletin informative and welcome any feedback.
If you want to improve the way that your organisation, regardless of size, uses information technology then please get in touch with me or my team.
Jeff Herbert, Managing Director, ICT Worldwide, jeff.herbert@ictworldwide.com, www.ictworldwide.com
In this Issue
OCTOBER 2010
• Christmas Break Upgrade Projects
• Desktop Virtualisation
• Insuring Your Data
• 5 Things to Improve the Speed of your PC’s
• How To Stop IT From Interfering in the Running of Your Business
Christmas Break Upgrade Projects
It’s likely that most of the computer users in your organisation will be off for some time over the Christmas/New Year period. Some organisations have extended shut downs and some not so long, but if there is downtime then this is an ideal time to make changes to your network. Whether it is just upgrading some servers or desktops, or a complete revamp, it is much easier when there are few users to disrupt.
ICT Worldwide can help you plan and implement the upgrades/changes to your network over this time. Our engineers can ensure that the job gets done quickly and we can work either autonomously or with your personnel to deploy and test the changes so that when your users return to work they have an improved network.
Some of the projects that are common include:
• Windows Server upgrades to 2008 R2
• Exchange 2010 upgrades
• Virtualisation of servers
• Storage Area Network implementation
• Security Review
If you’re considering upgrading or changing your network during the December/January break then talk to ICT Worldwide about what you are seeking to achieve. Contact us on 09 358 3340 or email to info@ictworldwide.com
Desktop Virtualisation
Virtual servers are widely accepted now but virtual desktops are still an emerging area, and the subject of a lot of hype but a number of questions remain, such as:
• Are they worth considering for your organisation?
• Is there a clear product leader?
• Is the technology mature?
• Is it cost effective?
Let’s look at each of these – first, are they worth considering? Yes, in the right circumstances. This is very vague, but justified – virtual desktops are essentially an immature technology so the business need has to be clear. Often when considering virtual desktops organisations discover that there are existing solutions that would deliver their requirement more simply and not need the infrastructure changes that virtual desktops require. Heavily graphical applications are usually held up as the reason why an organisation would need a virtual desktop, as the usual desktop delivery methods (XenApp, Terminal Server) aren’t great with heavy graphics, but in most cases organisations can get around this by giving that subset of users who require the graphics a dedicated PC for the graphics applications and can then remotely deliver the standard Office type applications to that machine if needed.
Is there a clear product leader?
No, there are several competing options. The two most high profile are VMware View and Citrix XenDesktop. View will only run on VMware ESX/vSphere virtualised servers, and XenDesktop will run on VMware, Hyper-V and of course XenServer. These two vendors are battling for market acceptance and are regularly at each other’s throats with mudslinging as they try to establish a dominant foothold. Both have their limitations but do benefit from the brand names.
Other options are Quest vWorkspace and Microsoft. Quest are a funny company – they are actually one of the largest software companies in the world, yet to many people outside of large enterprise IT environments they are unknown, because they have traditionally focused on some very effective software tools for very large businesses. In recent years they have purchased companies that have been providing innovative solutions and one of these was a company that had created an alternative to Citrix XenApp and had then developed this further into a combined offering that offers options of both virtual desktops and application delivery (ala Terminal Services but enhanced). It has suffered in comparison to VMware and Citrix through a lack of profile and international coverage but has quietly been building its successes, primarily in the US.
Is the technology mature?
In a nutshell, no. But it is fast improving. Between Citrix and VMware there is a big push to be ‘the one’ in this space and this competition is pushing innovations and improvements. Citrix have just announced the forthcoming release of XenDesktop 5, with a lot of improvements to the administration and installation process, and VMware have been working on their PC-over-IP technology for improving delivery of graphical applications. Virtualisation generally is a relatively immature technology area but it has improved and moved so quickly that virtual servers are now considered mainstream for production use so it may not be long before we view virtual desktops in the same way.
Is it cost effective?
Depends on your business really. Generally speaking no, because of the infrastructure that needs to be put in place to run it – virtual servers dedicated to the desktops, storage, the learning curve for using this etc. On the other hand, if you already have a lot of this infrastructure, or are of a size that the vendor is willing to cut you a really good deal, and your business requirements need something like virtual desktops for flexibility, then yes it can be.
Overall many of the requirements that organisations have for desktop delivery can already be handled by Citrix’s XenApp (what used to be known as MetaFrame or Presentation Server or even WinFrame when we first started using it way back when) or Microsoft’s Terminal Services, and there are also alternative vendors for this as well.
The vendors are hyping this up and pushing a lot of FUD about the competition but we are yet to see virtual desktops as a compelling solution. If however you think that your business requirements suit it talk to ICT Worldwide about it and we can organise a demo to go through it more deeply.
Contact us on 09 358 3340 or email info@ictworldwide.com
Insuring Your Data
Last month we talked about Disaster Recovery in the wake of the Christchurch earthquake, and then in other locations there have been flooded buildings and other extreme weather related issues which can have an adverse effect on businesses. Hopefully most organisations are insured for these types of events. Businesses insure buildings, contents and key people as it is best practice to do so. All of these are replaceable!
But have you ever thought about insuring the most important/irreplaceable commodity that you have – Critical Data?
If lost, could you replace or rebuild the critical data specific to your business?
The issue of data loss and the risks involved are well known, but previously there was no way to financially protect your organisation from this.
Now there is.
ICT Worldwide have partnered with Data Insure, a global specialist data insurance provider to enable all organisations to obtain insurance cover on their critical data.
Data Insurance provides an individual insurance policy against data loss. It Saves, Stores and Insures and never forgets…
• It saves by providing a fully automatic software suite that encrypts, compresses and transmits data.
• It stores by holding the encrypted data on zero failure systems with multiple disk copies, ready for immediate retrieval and restoration.
• It insures by paying for any required data restoration technical help and indemnifies in the unlikely event of data loss.
• The policy is fully backed by QBE Insurance
If you think you have data insurance:
• Do you have an individual policy from the insurer with a policy number?
• Do you get to put a specific value on your data, or does somebody set that for you?
• Is there a specific indemnity limit?
• Can you easily upgrade or downgrade your policy when you like?
• Do you have Data Insurance…warranty is a best efforts service, not an insurance product.
If you want to make sure that your data really is protected, and that you are financially protected then contact ICT Worldwide about Data Insurance. Contact us on 09 358 3340 or email info@ictworldwide.com
5 Things to Improve the Speed of your PC’s
We’ve all experienced it. That PC with so much supposed power that is just dragging the chain. You add more memory, but it’s still barely chugging – is this symptomatic of a major problem or just something that needs tweaking?. Here are five things you can take to help your machines run faster.
1: Defragment
This one should go without saying but few people regularly do this and not many IT Administrators set up machines to do this regularly. Regardless of which Windows desktop OS you use, make sure you either manually defragment or set the machine up to automatically defragment. When machines get too fragmented, they suffer serious performance degradation. Usually, the built-in Windows defrag tool works fine.
2: Clean up the disk
One of the first things to check on a machine that’s running slowly is how much of the hard disk has been used. If there isn’t roughly 10% of the hard disk free, it’s time to clean house. Get rid of the temporary files first. Then look at the obvious locations: recycle bin, pictures, music, videos. Once you have cleared those out, you can remove old restore points and shadow copies (from system restore) and installed programs from your downloads directory. If that doesn’t clear up enough space, it’s time to start removing unused applications.
3: Clean up the registry
Machines can get bogged down simply because of errors in the registry. This is a tricky area, the registry isn’t something just any old user (or administrator) should attack. There are a myriad of programs out there claiming to clean up your registry, and some of them are quite dubious in their business methods so tread carefully and backup your registry first.
4: Remove spyware/malware
Of course your organisation will be running a good quality anti malware software, but is this working on every user’s machine? Here at ICT Worldwide we are using Kaspersky and it allows the administrators to see which machines don’t have their AV turned on and which are not compliant. Many users think that they have protection running but for some reason it is not and to be able to see this centrally and do something about it is very useful.
5: Check the disk for errors
With a machine that’s ageing or whose hard drive has seen excessive use, sectors on that drive can wind up bad. To remedy this, you’ll need to issue a command and reboot your machine. You can use the Error-Checking tool in Windows XP to check the integrity of your hard disk.
Overall management and maintenance of PC’s can be troublesome and time consuming, affecting the productivity of the users and reducing the time available of the person responsible for IT administration in the business that could be spent on more strategic tasks. ICT Worldwide can handle all of the management and maintenance of your PC’s so that they are running as they should and issues are identified in advance, before they start affecting users. To find out more about how your business could run its IT more effectively talk to ICT Worldwide on 09 358 3340 or email info@ictworldwide.com
How To Stop IT From Interfering in the Running of Your Business
You’re trying to run a business doing what you do well. That might be manufacturing a product, providing financial planning services, accounting, sports coaching or distributing goods. Whatever the business, it’s likely that Information Technology (IT) is necessary but it’s meant to help you do business, not hinder you, right?
Too often IT gets in the way. Staff complain because the system ‘is running slow’, or the server crashes, products don’t work the way the glossy brochure said they would, and getting support is expensive and takes time – time that you don’t have. If you have in-house staff looking after the systems then their time spent dealing with these things takes them away from helping the business to use IT more effectively.
So how do you stop IT from interfering with running your business?
Instead of relying on ageing computer equipment and short term fixes if you put in place the right structure with equipment that is actually suited to your business needs as opposed to whatever the best deal was at the time you bought it, then you are going to get performance that is better aligned with your business. To do this you need to get the right advice and that means discussing your business requirements with an equipment supplier so that they can understand how you work and scope the equipment accordingly.
That’s all well and good, but once you’ve got the right type of equipment in place, and it’s reasonably new, how do you ensure that it keeps working?
Traditionally the approach would have been to get an IT provider to look after your network by coming out to fix things when they cause problems. This is what is known in the IT industry as ‘break-fix’ and some companies do very well out of it. They rely on systems falling over regularly so that they can get paid to get it back up and running.
The Problem With the Break-Fix Approach:
Only dealing with IT issues when they have stopped working means that this is a reactive way of doing business, not proactive and most businesses like to see themselves as proactive in how they run their business generally.
It means lots of waiting:
• Waiting for the support company to respond to your call
• Waiting for the problem to be identified (and it can take time to work out where the problem actually lies and what caused the failure)
• Waiting for replacement parts if needed
• Waiting for those parts to be installed….
Time is money and you’ll be paying for the support company’s time to do all this, and this is all time while your systems are not working properly.
A More Modern Approach:
These days with advances in technology a lot of the support can be carried out remotely.
This means:
• No waiting for a support engineer to arrive, they can remotely access the system to investigate immediately.
• If the support company is providing proactive monitoring, they can identify the potential problem in advance (many technologies send out alerts that they have pending issues so monitoring picks this up and flags it for investigation)
• Proactively identified issues can be remedied before the problem is actually noticed by the business.
As modern support providers charge a flat rate monthly figure and don’t charge extra for fixing the problems it is in their interest to make sure that things run smoothly, as the more time they have to spend fixing things the more it costs them.
This results in minimal downtime, few user problems (apart from those created by the users themselves…) and means that you can focus on your business, not having to worry about the IT system that you use. Better still, you don’t get hit with nasty high support bills because you’re simply charged a flat monthly fee, which makes budgeting easy. Internal IT related staff can focus their time on using technology to do smart things for the business, not just keeping the lights on.
So how do you stop IT from interfering in your business?
• Get suitable up to date infrastructure in place by getting the right advice
• Partner with a support provider who monitors your systems proactively
• Minimise your costs by getting flat rate services that you can budget on
• Sit back and concentrate on delivering your products and services to your clients by doing what you do best.
At ICT Worldwide we can provide a modern approach to supporting your IT. Our Private Cloud fixed monthly fee solutions ensure that your computer systems, including desktops and networking equipment are managed and maintained proactively with support requests being dealt with quickly. Our mission is to reduce your annual IT operational costs by up to 50%. What’s more, we’re so confident that we guarantee to beat what you’re paying your current provider by 15% for the same level of service. To find out more contact ICT Worldwide on 09 358 3340 or email sales@ictworldwide.com
About ICT Worldwide: ICT Worldwide have been in business since 2000, providing IT and Communication solutions to New Zealand and international organisations. Our focus is on providing effective solutions to business technology issues through Private Cloud support services, Network Consulting and Design, Software Licensing Procurement and Management, Hardware Procurement, Project Management, Technical Support and Deployment, Unified Communications and Security. Find out more at www.ictworldwide.com and contact us on 09 358 3340, email info@ictworldwide.com
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