2 “Must Haves” For Your Business Computer

If you are running a home office or small business, your computer is no longer just a toy – it’s a vital part of your business. What happens to your business if your computer is down for a week or, worse yet, all your business data is lost forever?

There are two things you must have on a business computer… an Internet security suite and a data backup system.

A security suite contains, at its core, a software firewall, antivirus and anti-spyware. There will be add-ons like Identity Theft protection, spam protection and parental control, but the main things you NEED are the first three. Read more.
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Small Business and the Cloud

There’s been a lot of talk lately about “the cloud” and how it affects businesses. First, what is the cloud? The cloud has often been synonymous with the whole internet, so what we’re talking about here is cloud computing. It’s been more commonly called Software as a Service (SaaS) and refers to software applications hosted on the Internet like Salesforce.com and Google Apps.

Technically, in addition to SaaS there is also Platform as a Service and Infrastructure as a Service. For example, Salesforce.com also has Force.com which acts as a PaaS, allowing developers to add on to the basic Salesforce.com software. Amazon Web Services acts as an IaaS for storing data, streaming video and other options in the cloud.

Cloud computing can be public, private or virtual private (you get a private section of a public provider). It’s really like using a mainframe computer in the 60′s – all the outlying parties use one main computer. It’s just that now that computer is on the web, not in the basement.

So what’s the big deal, you ask? You may be a small business owner with only a few computers. But, here’s the rub. What if you grow? How do you scale your business? Read more.
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Time To Transfer Those Old Backup Files

I recently came across a blog by Adrian Wong of TechARP who was experiencing about a 10% error rate on old CD-R’s that had backed up data on them.

Some of these were brand name CD’s and some generic brands, but all were less than 10 years old and were stored in a cool, dry and dark area.

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes of ZDNet didn’t experience the same data loss rate, but said it may be attributable to verifying the data at the time of backup. He also recommends Elprime Media Recovery ($19.95) for dead disks.

Whatever the case, with the decrease in cost of hard drives and even web space it only makes sense to take any backed up CD’s/DVD’s and transfer them to a new medium.

Read more.
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