Category Archives: Tech Trends

PDF Creation the Affordable Way

Posted on June 18, 2013 by Charlie Carerros

PDF files have become one of the primary file formats for sharing information and documents.  It is hard to browse websites without finding multiple links to these types of documents.  A quick search of my work laptop turned up 147 different PDF files.  These include instruction manuals for routers, documentation on how to configure VPN, release notes on new versions of Laserfiche and copies of my Quarterly Reviews.  I would hate to see how many of them we have on… [Read More…]

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Microsoft’s Blue Vision for Beating Apple

Posted on June 13, 2013 by Scott Hirschfeld

As one might expect, Microsoft does view Apple as one of its biggest competitors, and in the consumer device market Apple has gained serious momentum. Microsoft’s big picture strategy to compete has been a little bit broken and very reactive over the past years. Their response to the iPod was the “Me Too” release of the Zune, which tanked terribly. Windows smartphones have been around for a long time, but never really presented serious competition to the iPhone. The release… [Read More…]

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The End of an ERA

Posted on June 6, 2013 by Charlie Carerros

April 9th 2014, will be the day that Microsoft will finally kill off Windows XP or at least all support for that operating system.  As an engineer, who has worked with Microsoft operating systems since Windows 95, there are is place in my heart for the dependable Windows XP.  I probably know XP too well, inside and out.  However, there comes a time with technology, that we must move away from the old and grudgingly move forward. Of the two workstations and three… [Read More…]

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Protecting Your Information Assets

Posted on May 30, 2013 by Scott Hirschfeld

Taking Care of Your Data & Your Company It just happened again this week. One of our customers who uses us solely on a fix-when-broken basis lost data. Why? Their backup was not functioning properly. They needed to recover data, and when we logged into their server it became evident that something had stalled the backup over a week ago. It had not been backing up since then. Fortunately, the file they needed to recover was re-creatable and not a… [Read More…]

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Yammer Update

Posted on May 23, 2013 by Scott Hirschfeld

What’s Up with Yammer? Yammer is a hot social media tool for business. The easiest way to describe its features is that it creates a Facebook like social media site specifically for your company and your business partners. It allows collaboration in some ways not unlike Microsoft SharePoint, but with a great deal more simplicity. It really makes setting up a company Intranet easy. The big news last year was that Yammer was such a hit that Microsoft decided to… [Read More…]

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How to Use Parental Controls in Windows 8

Posted on May 16, 2013 by Charlie Carerros

It is an ongoing challenge for parents to keep kids safe while using the internet. Microsoft has added some new features in Windows 8 to lock down user accounts called Family Safety. You can see and control what your kids are doing on their computers. You can set Web filtering, monitor and restrict apps and even set time limits on computer usage. To Setup Family Safety for Windows 8: When you create an new user account for your child, you will have the option to select a check box… [Read More…]

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Google Glass: Victory for Virtual Reality, or a Disastrous Distraction?

Posted on May 9, 2013 by Joe Hichborn

What is Google Glass? First announced in 2011, Google Glass is Google’s pet project to introduce wearable computers to the modern age. It fits like a pair of glasses (standalone or over an existing pair), and provides mobile computing functionality as an overlay to your normal vision. You interact with Google Glass using voice commands – “Ok Glass”, brings up your menu options, with activities such as sending a message, recording a video, performing a search, getting directions, and so… [Read More…]

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Trending Mobile In a Big Way

Posted on April 25, 2013 by Scott Hirschfeld

Flurry Analytics recently posted statistics tracking usage of smartphones and tablets across both Android and IOS devices. These statics are interesting, and maybe not what one might expect. According to Flurry, the average time spent per mobile device is slightly more than 2.5 hours per day. Of that time, 80% is spent within applications, and only 20% is spent browsing the web. Surprisingly, email only gets about 3 minutes per day. What is the biggest category? You might have guessed… [Read More…]

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How to Best Protect Your Home PC from Viruses

Posted on April 17, 2013 by Charlie Carerros

Every now and then, we will receive a call about antivirus. Typically these are people calling to know which software they should use at home. Is Malwarebytes good enough? I hear that AVG Free  is a great tool? What about Microsoft Essentials? The other day, after over 15 years working in the IT Field, I came up with my final answer. Yes, I’m ready to be a millionaire. The final answer to the home antivirus question is, “What do you use… [Read More…]

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Finding a Google Reader Alternative

Posted on April 10, 2013 by Vicki Hirschfeld

As you may have heard, Google Reader will soon be no more. July 1st, Google will be shutting down its popular RSS reader much to many people’s disappointment. Some of you might wonder, why do you need an RSS reader? I have found using a reader makes it much easier to keep up with the blogs I follow. I know when there is a new post, can categorize them and easily save favorites. I am getting desperate in my quest… [Read More…]

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