Monroe’s Busiest Collision Repair Shop Avoids System Crashes With Network Management From Tech Experts
If you’ve ever experienced an automobile accident, you know how stressful and, at times, confusing the repair process can be. Paul and Tammi VanAken, the owners of Paul’s Quality Collision, have built their business around making the repair experience as efficient and pain-free as possible.
Paul started his auto and light truck repair business in 1982, and moved to a new, highly efficient, professional
designed facility on South Telegraph Road in 1991, where the business continues today. The repair shop is equipped with the state of the art tools and equipment needed to repair today’s modern vehicles to better than factory condition.
Chris Sherwood, Paul’s Quality Collision’s appraiser, uses a computerized estimating and quoting system to ensure customer’s vehicles are repaired correctly and promptly. |
“Computers have been essential in our administrative and production systems for nearly twenty years,” explained Paul. “We use them in production for damage analysis, specifications and paint mixing. In the office, we use computers for all sorts of management tasks, communications, documentation and data storage.”
The company relies heavily on their network for email and the Internet.
Paul explained: “We receive assignments, upload estimates, invoices and photos for our insurance and fleet customers. Much of our communication and technical resources are Internet based.”
Paul’s network consists of a file server running Windows 2003 Server and various desktop and laptop computers for staff use. A wireless network allows Paul and his staff to work in any part of the building and still have access to the network and the Internet.
According to Paul, one of the biggest business benefits that his business experiences in working with Tech Experts is dependability. “We know when we need help that someone who is knowledgeable and experienced will be on site
promptly.”
Paul continued, “One time, when our electricity went out and our battery backup failed, Tech Experts brought down a generator so our office could continue working. Now that’s going above and beyond!”
For more information about Paul’s Quality Collision, visit their website at http://www.paulsqualitycollision.com/, or call 734-242-7750.
Automatic Updates: Be Safe by Being Secure
 Will Alston is a PC hardware technician with Tech Experts. |
We are all well aware of how popular the Microsoft Windows operating system has become. Not only is this operating system popular for the business world, the vast majority of home computers run this operating system in various forms.
This popularity can make you a prime target for hackers and other criminals looking for a way to take advantage of a security risk in the operating system. Microsoft is keenly aware of this issue and takes steps almost instantly to make security patches and updates available for you, or your IT professional, to download and install.
Depending on how you have the automatic updates setting configured, these updates may or may not download and install themselves automatically, or you may have to initiate the process yourself manually.
While this feature is nice, most IT pros would rather pick a time to download and install these updates in a controlled situation, where the loading process can be monitored for any problems or issues that may arise.
The automatic updates utility can be accessed through the control panel. Once you open up automatic updates, you have the option there to select automatic updates, but even if you have automatic updates turned on, it is always a good idea to visit Microsoft’s update website occasionally and have the update center scan your computer to check and make sure you have all the latest updates available.
Microsoft also has a very thorough program called “Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer 2.1.” This tool written for IT professionals provides a streamlined method of finding common security misconfigurations.
This tool allows our technicians to quickly scan your server or workstations and identify any missing security patches and provides a quick link to the supporting white paper that will explain to the technician exactly what security issue is being addressed with the particular security patch. Once enough of these security patch releases become available, Microsoft bundles them all together into what is called a service pack. This allows IT pros to download this patch to portable media and deploy it very quickly in a network environment.
I cannot stress the importance of keeping up with these service packs and security patches. A case in point, I went to a client’s office and checked every one of their workstations to see how “up to date” they were.
One of the stations required a service pack installation that has been available for months now. In addition, it
required 59 additional updates to bring it up to date.
You can imagine the risk that this system was to the client’s network. We now have this client’s network under our Managed Services Plan. This plan is offered for a nominal monthly fee and encompasses their server and all stations.
Now these stations are monitored around the clock by our network operations center, and updates are downloaded and installed after hours, as soon as the updates are available.
So make sure to keep your computer and your information safe by being secure and contact Technology Experts to get your network protected by our Managed Services Plan. It’s the best way to make sure your network is safe and secure.
What Is Windows Update?
Windows Update is a service provided by Microsoft that provides updates for the Microsoft Windows operating system and its installed components, including Internet Explorer.
An optional feature disables access to Windows Update and enables access to Microsoft update, an expanded version of the service which provides updates not just for the operating system & Internet Explorer, but also for other Microsoft Windows software, such as Microsoft Office, Windows Live applications, and Microsoft Expression.
Security updates are delivered on the second Tuesday of each month, called “Patch Tuesday,”
but security updates can be delivered whenever a software update is required to prevent an exploit targeting Windows users.
Windows Update can be configured to install updates automatically, ensuring that a computer is always up-to-date and not vulnerable to computer worms and other malware.
Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008 and the most recent Windows 7 provide a Control Panel to configure update settings and check for updates.
For previous versions of Microsoft Windows, updates can be downloaded from theWindows Update website, using Internet Explorer.
Gone In Sixty Seconds: Protecting Your Laptop & Data
 Ryan Seymour is Tech Experts' Service Manager and a PC hardware specialist. |
September was a whirlwind travel month for me, having been in both Charlotte, North Carolina and Chicago in the last three weeks of the month.The training is great, but as anyone who has traveled lately knows, the airports can become a real challenge.
I was waiting in the Charlotte airport for my return flight to Detroit, and watched an awful story unfold.
A passenger, who was obviously a business owner or executive was searching frantically for his laptop case. After about 20 minutes, airport police showed up and it turns out his laptop had been stolen.
Business owners as well as your average everyday computer users are turning to laptops more and more each and every day, due to
their mobility and the ability to keep them in touch with the office no matter where they are.
A huge importance that many seem to forget is keeping their data safe, and doing regular backups. I would guess that every three in five users are not performing any type of backups. They run the huge risk of losing all their valuable data, programs, and even their entire computer as the gentleman in the airport did.
It is crucial to have a backup solution in place, especially for business owners who keep most of their work information on their laptop computer.
With today’s technology options, you can find a backup solution that will work for you, and there seems to be a price range for everybody.
Backups can be performed in several ways, from a manual backup to a CD or DVD, some form of removable media like a flash drive,
or SD card, and there are even the higher end solutions like BDR and off site backups.
Typically a backup solution would come with a piece of software to control your backups. Things such as what you’re backing up, how often your backing up, and where you want the backups to go.
The beauty of using software is it almost completely automates the process, and becomes something you don’t have to worry about
any longer, knowing that if your computer is stolen, or your hard drive suddenly crashes out, you have a good copy of your data, and you can be back up and running in no time at all.
My favorite solution is the offsite backup, which can be offered thanks to the Internet. With an offsite backup system, data that
is on your laptop, workstation, or server(s) can be sent out across the Internet (typically encrypted) to an offsite location.
So for example, you could be working at your company, and having all your daily additions to a highly secure data center out in
the cloud. This would protect your information from a disaster such as a building burning down, or a fatal hardware crash.
If that sounds like overkill for your situation, an easier solution can be used, such as backing up once a week to a flash drive.
All Windows based systems have a utility built in called Backup and Restore. This utility will allow users to backup just their personal data, such as pictures, documents, emails, etc. or even take it a step further and back up the entire computer’s configuration, including the data.
Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore is most useful for disaster recovery when your PC malfunctions.
This feature helps you create complete PC backups, and then in the event of a serious system issue or data loss, Windows Complete
PC Backup and Restore can restore your entire PC environment, including the operating system, installed programs, user settings, and data files.
If you do not have currently have a backup solution implemented, please contact our technical support team. We can work with you to set up backups to a flash drive or CD.
We also have a great offsite solution for $39.99 per month that will keep all of your data safe in the event of a failure. It works transparently in the background, encrypting and forwarding your data to our data center, where’s it is stored and updated as needed.
The best thing about this type of solution is that it doesn’t require you to do anything - the backups occur automatically, and we’re notified if there is ever a problem where your backup didn’t complete properly.
LoJack For Laptops
The technology behind Computrace LoJack for Laptops by Absolute Software is the Computrace Agent, a small software client that is embedded into the BIOS firmware of most computers at the factory. Or Tech Experts can install this agent for you.
The Agent in your computer maintains daily contact with the Absolute Monitoring Center. If you report your computer stolen, Agent contact will increase to every 15 minutes.
Increased contact allows Computrace to obtain specific details like the physical location of your computer, any activity that has occurred post-theft, and other important data that will aid Computrace in working with local law enforcement to catch the thief and return your property to you.
Regardless of recovery status, you can remotely delete data to remove some or all of the information stored on your computer
so that it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.
This could include files and applications containing personal photos, internet bookmarks, browser cookies, financial information, and stored passwords.Everything an identity thief would need to steal your identity.
On the web: www.absolute.com
Great Reasons To Consider A Windows 7 Upgrade
 Corey Bogedain is a network technician and web developer with Tech Experts. |
Are you one of the computer users who didn’t want to risk the Vista upgrade? While we didn’t really experience any problems with clients who upgraded to Vista, many companies have decided to skip Vista and move right to Windows 7.
Windows 7 is available now to business users under the Microsoft licensing program, and will be in general availability at the end of the month.Microsoft says it will run as well as Windows XP, and have the enhanced look and feel of Windows Vista.
Here are a few of my favorite features in Windows 7 that might make you want to look into upgrading to Microsoft’s newest operating system.
User Account Control
Many users found the enhanced user account control (UAC) function in Windows Vista difficult to work with. If you are not sure what UAC is, it is the dialogue box that will pop up when you run an unknown application. It asks, “Are you sure you want to open this?” Microsoft has greatly improved the options for fine tuning this security feature, so that you don’t have to turn it completely off.
Windows Shake
Windows 7 has a great new feature that helps you keep your desktop organized when you have several programs open at the same time. When you have multiple windows open you are able to click and shake the window you want to keep open and then all the other windows will minimize making it easier to sort through them. Then, if you want them back up you can just shake it again and all the windows come back up again. This, I would say, is one of the best features of Windows 7.
Very Quick Startup
Microsoft has finally solved the slow startup issues many users experienced in Windows XP and Windows Vista. It can be time consuming to just sit and wait for the computer to startup. Sometimes we have clients tell us their computer takes so long to startup that they simply leave it on all the time. Now with Windows 7, Microsoft has made the startup time about twice as fast as a comparable system running Windows Vista or Windows XP.
Auto Window Sizing
If you like the windows shake feature you might also like this windows feature. By moving your window to the top of the desktop the window will automatically maximize. Now if you move the window to the left or the right of the desktop then the window will be maximized, but only on fifty percent of the screen.
Customizing the System Tray
There have always been a lot of options for customizing the Windows system tray in Windows XP and Windows Vista. Windows 7 includes a feature for fine tuning the yellow popup balloon you always see by the clock on the system tray.
In Windows 7 you have the ability to customize which applications are allowed to notify you using the yellow popup bubble by the clock. In Windows XP and Windows Vista the only thing you could do to remove those notifications was to find a Windows registry hack to turn them off.
These are just a few of the many new features that make an upgrade to Windows 7 compelling. If you’ve just purchased a new computer, more than likely you’re entitled to a free copy of Windows 7 (you may have to pay shipping for the actual CD).
We have several systems running Windows 7 in our office, and have found very few compatibility issues. If you’d like to see it in action, feel free to stop by or call our office.