Windows 8 - 4 Million already?

Wow.  I know that I'm always big on new things, and Windows 8 is the newest kid on the block...but 4 million upgrades in as many days?  That boggles the mind.  Over on ArsTechnica, they mentioned quite a bit about this...but from my experience in the industry, this is a much faster adoption than Windows 7.

You can say that it might be because the price point is right.  For $40 you can get Windows Pro, and that's a steal in itself already.  If you just recently bought a computer (since June) you can get a Windows 8 upgrade for just $15!  No the product isn't perfect, but then is Windows ever perfect???  My experience has been wonderful with it (despite having to restore my computer to pre-win8-candidate install and losing all of my music...thank you iTunes Match for saving my ass) , and seeing it run on my 4 year old C2D laptop quite well is a joy.  (Many of you don't know I did get Windows 7 to run on an ancient IBM T21 laptop with only 512mb of ram...so Microsoft is thinking about people with older computers now.)

So if you haven't looked at it...do so.  Install it on your wife's/husband's computer...see how they react to it.  After the day long learning curve, it's been smooth sailing ever since.

What are you doing with Windows 8? :)

Meraki Giveaway...

Now before you say 1 of 2 things...

1) What are you giving away? or

2) What is Meraki giving away?

Let me qualify this by saying... Go to this link if you're a startup with either Seed, Series A or Angel funding.  You NEED to do this.

Meraki is giving away approximately $10,000 in networking equipment and licenses to Startups.

 

I don't know what to say...I love this company already...and here they are helping out startups, with the HOPE that they'll buy more in the future.  Genius and giving at the same time.

If you're a startup and you're reading this, and you need help...contact me...otherwise...

Say more?  Nah.  It'll ruin it.   :)

 

 

Sick Cellphones, and other news items

Hi again!  There's been so much news floating down over this week that I can't keep up, so I'm going to do a little bit of a digest and links here. :)

1) Here's a great article on how your cellphone is making you sick.  You carry it everywhere, it's covered in germs from your mouth and nose...AND you share it with people?  Ew.  We've all heard this before, but it really is true.  Look up what Coliforms are and realize THOSE are on your phone.  Get an electronic wipe and clean it. :)

2) Windows 8 releases on Friday to the public, but you can watch the launch event today.  While MS has launch events today, Friday is the day to get your copy of Windows 8.  If you haven't used it yet, you should.  While the learning curve is steep at first, you'll do fine.  There's a tutorial built into the install, so it'll walk you through everything before it even starts. :)

3) Microsoft Surface - there's a neat article from CNet here that asks the question, is the surface a table or a notebook?  or is it in-between in a whole new category?  It's a good question...I'm dying to get my hands on one to find out.  Are you?

4) Windows 8 upgrade - Nuff said.  Go get it for $40.

5) Lastly...some discounts through the 31st for you. (while supplies last)...

And from our friends at Low Latency...

Dropped Packets No More!

No, not the webcomic. :)

This is something that we need.  Engineers make the world go round, yet there are times when people don't even think about it.  Engineers helped design the car that gets you and your family to and from wherever you need to go...they designed that freeway overpass that has alleviated traffic...they designed a more efficient engine for vehicles that uses less gas and drives prices down...and now those cuddly buggars may have solved your dropped wifi and cell calls issues.

This article here goes over how they've gone from packets to a series-of-packets.  The way this helps is pretty cool.  To break it down, if a packet is "damaged" in transit signal, the receiver ignores it and waits for another packet with that info to be sent, causing a traffic jam which relates as network slowness or disconnects.  In this case, this new setup will send a series of packets at once which will help the packets to not be lost or dropped.  While this will not boost healthy signals, for poor signals it may mean the difference between life and death...or at least going from .5 megabits per second to 13 megabits per second!

This is almost as cool as the nine gigapixels telescope! ;)

Have a great Thursday!

from our friends at dp.lomin.com :)

Drobo in the NY Times

For those of you who haven't heard about Drobo, they do produce an amazing product for smaller companies when it comes to backup, but they also produce a larger set of models that are starting to take hold in the large SMB and Enterprise spaces.    It was great to see this piece in the NY Times the other day, and is a nice, easy explanation about their product.  Take a look and see!

Meraki's newest products and Software Update!

As many of you know, I spent a couple days up at Meraki's offices during the first week of October, being technically trained on their MX Routers, MS Switches, MR wireless units, and their Systems Manager program.  It was an intense 2 days, and really forced me (who's not actually worked on a switch since 2006) to dig in and remember what I had to do.  I trained alongside some great smaller local VARS, as well as a couple of folks from Italy & Japan who flew in for the training.  I was the only large VAR present...and it felt VERY weird.  I was the slow kid with the switch and router, but the second day with the Wireless and System Manager, I was far ahead of everyone else.  It was a great experience to learn directly from them, and now that I'm certified, I can teach and assist my coworkers and their clients when it comes to Meraki.

I also learned that driving to San Francisco from Los Angeles on a time schedule is more stressful than it's worth.  But it was fun to fly along the 5 Freeway at 2am doing 110mph. ;)  Ok on to new stuff!

Announced this past week, Meraki has a couple new products and whole host of features added in their latest software update.  Let's discuss what they have...

First up is the new MX60W.  This combo unit of their MR12 wireless & MX60 router creates a complete access & security solution for a branch office, or a home office.  It'll provide the enterprise quality for wired and wireless connectivity, a firewall, site to site vpn, content filtering and the new Intrusion Detection System (see below).  MSRP: $845

The next new piece of hardware is designed for the Cloud-managed teleworker.  Have some of your staff working from home a couple days a week?  How about one of these little guys to help make sure that any resources they are pulling are not compromised?  The Z1 is a small form factor unit with 4 ports for printers, phones and other devices (a 1GbE WAN port and 4 GbE LAN ports) and a dual-concurrant 802.11n wireless radio.  Looks great doesn't it?  While it's not a full access point, it'll definitely be a much cheaper unit to purchase for your teleworkers than a full access point.  MSRP $199  (PC Mall price $172.99)

Intrusion Detection System (IDS) - Before you'll remember that I mentioned Intrusion Detection System.  Meraki is now including IDS in their routers/switches, and it should have been pushed down recently to your system.  Built on Sourcefire's Snort, it features signature, protocol, and anomaly based inspection.  It'll deliver some iron-clad security, while allowing it to be monitored from your Meraki Dashboard.

Bounjour Gateway - Yup, they've finally added this, and I can hear network admins cheering.  (One of my friends just said that sounds a lot like zombies saying, "brains...brains..." but you can't please everyone.)  With all of the Apple TV units, iPods, printers and AirPlay mirroring out there, this will allow you to throttle the Bonjour traffic, much like how you manage your Layer 7 Traffic Shaper.  Hooray there!

Traffic Shaper Enhancements - Whammo!  This now has a better classification engine, so it'll have better application insight, and report web browsing activity.

I've got a special training with my friends at Meraki next week, in which we're going to go over these enhancements as well as a few more things for their Systems Manager program.

What???  You're not using Systems Manager?  It's free, an asset manager, software manager, Mobile Device Manager, can give you deep insight into your desktops/laptops/tablets...and it is FREE.  Go here right now and check it out.  Download it and test it.  If you want, contact me and I will walk you through it on my personal dashboard.

If you'd like a free trial of their products, go here and let's talk about that...I can help. Or text MERAKI to our google voice number. (pull the number from that link)   :)

Other than that, have a WONDERFUL Friday & weekend!

More on Windows 8...

Ok folks, the Deluge of Windows 8 is about hit...the dam is cracking and once it goes, the whole town will be wiped out!   Sounds like a disaster movie right?  Nope, it's the first list of the Windows 8 products!

I was cruising my Feedly feed today while waiting for a client to answer the phone and came across this gem from Dan Ackerman at C/Net.  Links to all of the new hardware shipping out on October 26th (Win 8 release date for those who missed my prior article) show off how great Windows 8 looks and will work.

Some of my favorites are:

HP Envy Spectre Touchsmart XT    Lenovo IteaTab Lynx   Samsung Ativ Smart PC

 

Take a look and see! :)  For those of you who want into Windows 8 now, you can buy the volume licensing, but the retail boxes and units will be available October 26.

Acrobat XI is here!

Happy Monday to you all!  Just a short note, Adobe has released their newest version of Acrobat and it's available now.

Some notes on the features and why you should upgrade:

1) Adobe only supports Acrobat 9, X and XI now  (so no needs to update patch)

2) New Enhanced Protected Mode

3) More Drawing & Annotation tools (STICKY NOTES!  who doesn't love sticky notes?)

4) Full Microsoft integration across their Office tool and IE

5) and also a "Touch Mode" to obviously work with Windows 8 and other touch OSes.

From what I've seen, it looks a bit more streamlined, a little less annoying, and a cleaner product.

To order, of course give us a call or email.  You can see the retail pricing here on our site, but ask me nicely when you buy from me and you'll get a discount. :)

Standard: Full version / Upgrade License / Retail Box

 

Windows 8...on your plate soon!

A lot of you know that I've been using Windows 8 since it became available to test.  Much like Windows 7, it's been a pleasure testing it, and I can't wait to have the actual version installed.  Being who I am here, I get a lot of questions about "when is it coming out?"  a heck of alot.  So, thanks to the folks at CNet, here's a schedule of the Windows 8 release:

October 12 - Microsoft starts taking Pre-Orders for the retail version of Windows 8 Pro, and for PCs with it.

October 21 - Windows 8 phones, and the Samsung & Asus tablets become available for pre-order.

October 25 - Windows 8 Launch event in NYC.

October 26 - Officially available to consumers.  The Microsoft Surface tablet is also available starting on this date.  Preorder units will arrive as wel.

October 29 - Launch event for Microsoft Windows Phone 8 in San Francisco.

Come on now...who wants a Surface? :)

Skype Ransomworm...

Howdy folks!  Back again after being out 3.5 days last week...and it's taken 2 days to catch up!  :P

Going to start this entry's off with a doozie...the Skype Ransomworm.  I actually hadn't heard about this until a couple of friends mentioned it yesterday...and oh heck it's something to pay attention to!  Trend Micro has a good write up on their site here, but let me give you the basics.

This is a version of the Dorkbot worm that goes through the standards of stealing every single login and password you have to become a part of a botnet.  Typical Worm stuff...but it's coming out of Skype contact lists...and it's demanding money.  Some of the emails sent by this virus will contain a link that'll download ransomware onto computers, demanding $200 be sent or the computer will be shutdown/erased/etc.

In the first 24 hours, TrendMicro had blocked over 2000 instances.  While not a OMGWTFBBQ moment, it's always good to be aware. :)



Something for you to ponder (make sure your AV is up to date) while I prepare a dissertation on what I was taught up at Meraki's offices last week.  I'll be sure to share as soon as I have time. :)

 

Have a great rest of your day! :)

DragonTech Deals - first for October

First up this month...HP Printers!

I've always been happy to hear that many businesses use HP printers.  As track records go, I've always been pleased with their business line...and so have my clients.

But everyone needs a new printer...Pick out a new one here.

We're offering several quality deals...so the question is...what are you printing with? :)

Resetting for Autumnn

On this day in 1932, Babe Ruth made his famous called shot against Charlie Root in Game 3 of the World Series.  It was amazing, and showed how intimidating and good that man was at baseball.    And on this day in 2012, we've rolled back the pricing on the DragonTech Deals page, and we're getting ready to add new stuff this week!

So the Kingston SSD drives will remain, as those kits are GREAT deals...some of those prices did go DOWN btw. :)

Secondly, this is going to be a quiet week I think, as I'm going to be out for a conference/learning session at the offices of Meraki for a couple of days.  I've been offered the chance to earn a technical certification on their products, and did not want to pass that chance up.  I've talked a lot about these folks over the past year of this blog, and rightfully so.  They have their fingers firmly in the future, and have created a company that is looking forward to be a part of the future of business...not the present.

So...with some luck, I"ll be back to post on Friday with new deals, and a ton of Meraki information.  For now, enjoy this and laugh...