SMB IT | Curtis Franklin | March 2007

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March 2007

March 30, 2007 | Comments: (0)

* 5 Coolest Gadgets from CTIA. In video form. Includes a couple of cool new cell phones from Pantech and Samsung, a new media player and more. (Source: NetworkWorld)

* ICANN shoots down .XXX again. The concept of a separate porno domain has been floated before...and shot down before. But ICANN just did it again at its 28th International Public Meeting in Lisbon. Again, the ICANNers said that because .XXX is a content-based domain, it would have set them up as a content-regulating body, which isn't their mandate. (Source: PC World)

* Online gambling booming...offshore. Last September, Congress passed the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act--basically an anti-Internet gambling law. They figured that would kill online gambling, but apparently, all it's done is prompt the gambling entrepreneurs to move offshore. (Source: InformationWeek)

* New target for burgeoning game designers: retirees. Seems there's a new trend in the video game market and that's the over 50 and even the over 60 crowd. These folks have time on their hands, money in their pockets and a need to to maintain hand-eye coordination. And, again, it looks like the Wii is out front here. (Source: CNET)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 30, 2007 08:42 AM

March 29, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/29

* Yahoo's really upping the email ante. Yesterday it said it intended to offer unlimited email storage by May. Now Yahoo says it's opening its email API to outside developers. That means third-party Web 2.0 collab apps on an email client with much of the flexibility of Outlook. (Source: CNET)

* ThinkFree and Zimbra go offline. Both companies used O'Reilly's Emerging Technology Conference to announce they were readying offline clients for their online productivity suites. So the idea is to keep basic productivity features local and move collab and other Web 2.0 features online. Gonna be tricky beating MS in that department. (Source: PC Mag)

* Facial recognition as local biometric. Canadian company, Bioscrypt, uses a smart WebCam with infrared capabilities to let a user's face take the place of his thumbprint when accessing a local desktop. Good for desktop users, but most likely a pain for road warriors. (Source: ZDNet)

* HP makes big SMB push with 12 new products. The company announced all 12 new products plus other SMB online initiatives at its "The Art of Small Business" event at SF's Modern Museum of Art. The new products range from new notebooks, to servers, switches, printers and other platforms. They've also added a new Small Business Connection section to its SMB site. Loads more info in the complete press kit. (Source: HP)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 29, 2007 08:11 AM

March 28, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/28

TI's projector phone prototype
* Tech companies want TV spectrum for WiFi. Tech giants, including the Googlers, the Intelzoids and the Microsoftees, are asking the FCC to let them utilize unused portions of the TV spectrum to offer wireless networking, wireless services (including potential partner possibilities) to the public. FCC will think about it, but probably won't decide until this stuff is up for sale in 2009. (Source: InfoWorld)

* Dell wants to be friendly with Web 2.0 SMBs. If your company is banking on Web 2.0 and/or SaaS, Dell wants to design your data center. And to prove it, the company's put together a consulting service specializing in just that. (Source: PC World)

* Cool SMB marketing: Blurb intros BookSmart Beta. Blurb.com is an online self-publishing service that can be a real boon to SMB guerilla marketing types. The company's just introed a beta of BookSmart a new suite of authoring tools as well as a back-end networking boost to help speed up file transfers. (Source: Blurb.com)

* TI intros cell phone projector. Texas Instruments used the CTIA Wireless Show in Orlando to demo this handy future gadget: a cell phone that can double as a video projector. Could mean the world to wandering salesfolk tired of lugging around notebooks and mini-projectors. (Source: DailyTech)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 28, 2007 05:30 AM

March 27, 2007 | Comments: (0)

REVIEW: HP Color LaserJet 1600 Great for SBs

I hate it when I'm the last to know. Must be pathological. But when HP shipped us the Color LaserJet 3800dn and then agreed to leave it with us for a long-termer (review on that soon), I had some fun strutting around and talking about the 20ppm color laser I had setup in my home office.

Then last weekend I'm over at a friend's house and he prints out Google directions in color. Being a nerd, I notice it's not an inkjet print, but a laser. Naturally, I inquire. Seems he just bought a new color laser from HP. Win lotto, I ask. Nope, he says, it cost $300.

That gets me giggling, 'cause a color laser at that money has to suck...somehow. So I check it out. Turns out it's the HP Color LaserJet 1600. First off it's smaller than my 3800dn, but that's actually a bonus in a small office setting. It's rated for 8ppm in either color or B&W--which is definitely slower than the 3800dn, but not enough to make me look down on it for the money.

It's USB-only, which I started to giggle about, but then he showed me where he'd plugged it into his WD NetCenter (his actually WORKS) shared hard disk. Those things (similar to the Iomega StorCenters) have USB ports in the chassis specifically designed to make them print servers. His was sharing the 1600 across his 8-box home network, no trouble.

Then he printed a few pics for me, and it just got worse. I'm no print quality aficionado, but his color print quality looked darn good to me. Certainly as decent as anything I'd recently run off my 3800dn. Hey, I'm sure Xerox' Phaser 8560 is a sexy machine for higher-end office use; but if you're looking to get really nice color print quality into a small office environment, the HP Color LaserJet 1600 is definitely worth a look. Just make sure you've got a print server sitting somewhere.

Color LaserJet 1600
Hewlett-Packard
List price: $299.99 Froogle Search
Pros: Way cheap, great print quality, good size
Cons: USB-only, 8ppm

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 27, 2007 06:00 PM

March 27, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/27

* SMBs still have security worries. Latest report from security vendor Finjan, is that the US is still the malware capitol of the planet. And that's usually because of zombie botnets infecting thousands of compromised PCs without their owners' knowledge. Desktop security is NOT a done deal boys and girls. (Source: InfoWorld)

* Which might be why ID theft DOUBLED in two months. That's right, not a misprint. A study done by Web security monitoring firm, Cyveillance, says that malware and phishing instances jumped by 50% and 200%, respectively. Desktop security, boys and girls and that means both software AND education. (Source: Dark Reading)

* Novell takes Microsoft InfoCard tech open source. Novell's taking advantage of its alliance with Redmond with identity information. InfoCard, now called Windows CardSpace, is Microsoft's next-gen PassPort technology--part of Vista. Novell's taking that code and porting it into a format that'll run on both Linux and the Mac. Could be an important development for e-tailers looking for a common authentication/payment platform. (Source: NetworkWorld)

* The Evil Empire relents...a little. I've given Verizon a lot of brown stinky stuff on its business practices--mainly the part where we're stuck with aging broadband technology lagging behind other hip, technophile-type countries like, say, Slovenia. Well, they've had a change of heart. Announced a $6 billion 3-year deal with Alcatel-Lucent to upgrade their wireless data network. 'Course, most likely means we'll all need to get new phones to take advantage, but I guess that'll be all right in three years. Still, no warm-and-fuzzies with Verizon until I see actual benchmark tests. (Source: PC World)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 27, 2007 08:06 AM

March 26, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Xerox Pumps Out 7 New Printers and Plan for SMB

Most folks treat printers as commodity items these days. Requirements usually run "laser or inkjet", "networked or USB", "color or B&W", "paper tray size". Maybe they look for an evelope feeder, too. BUt while that will get you a decent printer for either personal or small biz use, there's a lot more to the paper pumpers than just those five criteria--and Xerox is trying to make that apparent with 7 new offerings that the company just introduced at its small business expo in Florida (yes, I was invited; no, I couldn't go; yell at the editors).

At this shindig, Xerox introduced three new color lasers, two color multi-function jobs and two new fax boxes--no partridge, no pear tree. Pricing starts around $499 and speeds go all the way from 5 ppm to 42ppm depending on your pleasure.

But Xerox isn't stopping with base hardware specs. Everything's getting smarter these days (except me) and printers are no exception. One addition that Xerox is pushing, for example, is document management. Nope, it's not just a doc management platform that Xerox bought and pasted onto its products. This is a whole consulting platform, similar to what Toshiba does with their print products. Buy a certain amount/type of Xerox machines and the company offers consultants to come on-site, identify your document processing model and then streamline it. Hopefully using all-Xerox products.

And that, by the way, lets us digress to Xerox' new sales announcement. The company used its Florida engagement to make clear that it wants a bigger slice of the SMB pie. So, they're making their full family of office products available through a new network of certified resellers. And, yup, you guessed it: These same resellers will all be qualified and trained on Xerox' doc management consulting services and similar technologies. They're also providing these agents with new account leads, incentive plans and similar sales tools all aimed at selling into SMB.

Don't panic. You'll still be able to do a quick printer purchase off the Web, but talking to a reseller and/or their consulting branch can get you new business process information that might save some real money.

But let's get back to new printer techs to watch. Green is one. Xerox's new Phaser 8560, for example, is based on a cartridge-less print engine--that means about 90% less ink and plastic waste for this type of printer--at least according to Xerox.

If you do a lot of higher-end photo printing, then check out the Phaser 6180, which apparently uses a new type of 'high gloss' toner to achieve excellent color reproduction.

Okay, they're not earth shattering innovations to the bedrock of your bottom line, but they can all either save some money or put out a better document. Either way, it's worth the 10 minutes of extra think time before purchase.

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 26, 2007 01:09 PM

March 26, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/26

* Music albums no longer the hot ticket. Seems the digital download phenom is having a tangible effect on the music industry after all. This story follows a new band signed by Universal--but not for an album, just for a couple of songs to test out the iTunes-dominated digital waters. (Source: New York Times)
* See, now the Web 2.0 office guys are thinking. I've dumped all over the Office 2.0 crowd (Zoho's the best, Google's the giggle). What's the point of offering Office 97 in a Web browser. Fortunately, that's not what the smartest of the Web 2.0 crowd is looking to build. The Under the Radar conference showcased a number of new productivity applications designed to make use of the newest Web technologies, including social networking, tagging, Web-based app sharing and other forms of smart data associations. An interesting new term out of all this is 'Cognitive Intelligence'. Nice summary of articles on this topic here. (Source: CNET)
* Watch out for the workplace bully. Trend story on a study showing that 44 percent of American workers say they've been bullied or abused in one way or another at work. Geez, whatever happened to the John Wayne approach? Just belt the guy and go get some beers. HA! (Source: ConnectIT)
* GRISoft show up new AV products for SMBs. They're coming out with a couple of server-based anti-virus tools and AV client management tools as well as full security clients, including firewalls and anti-malware. Pricing is certainly reasonable, tho the story glosses over the fact that the new clients aren't Vista-compatible yet. (Source: eChannelLine)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 26, 2007 08:05 AM

March 23, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Scary Article for Small IT Companies

The Washington Post (the only national daily in which I've ever had my byline) just ran a frightening and outrageous story, written anonymously, from the chief exec of a small US IT company. Seems this person received a "National Security Letter" from the FBI.

Over 140,000 of these letters have been sent out over the last few years, and they seem to follow the same pattern: (1) They want detailed and confidential information on one or more of the letter-recipient's clients. (2) They haven't be approved or even seen by a judge. (3) They carry a gag order saying the letter recipient can't discuss the client, the information request or even the fact that the they received the letter under penalty of criminal prosecution. Hence the anonymous publishing.

Whoever wrote this article took the gutsy road--didn't turn over the information and contacted the ACLU instead. The article details the years (still ongoing and the original letter was received three years ago) he/she has lived with this fight against a government behemoth that looks to be systematically abusing the powers it was granted under the Patriot Act.

See, this stuff tends to get worse before it gets better.

(via Slashdot)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 23, 2007 07:59 AM

March 23, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/23

* Child recovery on USB. Okay, it's not really SMB, but it's a good public service announcment. The AmberAlert.com missing child recovery site announced that it's put together a Child ID Kit that fits on a USB thumbdrive. (Source: InfoWorld)
* Symantec to debut new mobile management suite next week. It's based on stuff licensed from Bluefire. Has AV, firewall, anti-malware, all for various mobile devices. They'll be showing it at next week's CTIA show. (Source: NetworkWorld)
* But they'll have competition from XML standards. To accomplish much the same thing as Bluefire (mobile and desktop mgmt on one platform), the Desktop Management Task Force (DMTF) is publishing new papers covering new XML-based Web services specs that should be able to accomplish cross-platform management without the need two switch consoles. (Source: TechWeb)
* New tools for becoming a Big Brother Boss. Comes from Ascentiv LLC and it's called BeAware. The name is aimed at the boss, who needs to be aware of what his employees are doing--not the employees who need to be aware that the boss is watching. (Source: Dark Reading)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 23, 2007 07:24 AM

March 22, 2007 | Comments: (0)

REVIEW: FreshBooks Means E-Invoicing on the Web

An old colleague, Jamie Bsales, just pubbed this review on FreshBooks, a solid online invoicing system for freelancer types--like me--or small businesses. In fact, I'm sure my managing editor would love me to use FreshBooks, since I'm about four months behind on that.

It's especially useful in that scenario since I bill InfoWorld for regular features, like my column and this blog. FreshBooks will let me set these invoices up automatically, so I don't have to remember (or not) to do it every month. You can even define recurring line items.

Bsales details more about FreshBooks in his review, but the key points include a dashboard so you get a quick view of all your billing (see screenshot below), a Time Tracking feature (see the screenshot below), and the ability to customize the default invoice (see screenshot) with your own logo and similar formatting.

Oh yeah, and it's free for fewer than three clients. Check it out.

SCREENSHOTS:
FreshBooks Dashboard

FreshBooks Time Tracker

FreshBooks Sample Invoice

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 22, 2007 01:53 PM

March 22, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/22

* SugarCRM update to go beta next month. I like SugarCRM--except for real estate property management CRM. For that, you go to FB2 Corp. Don't question it. Just go. But for the rest of you, SugarCRM is great and they're coming out with a new version in beta next month. Check it out. (Source: InfoWorld)
* Verizon beefs up MPLS VPN service. The Evil Empire is still trying. They've 'enhanced' the service level agreements for their Layer 3 MPLS VPN service--pretty much the foundation service for most of their other business network services. Still, I'd be REAL careful about reading the fine print. (Source: NetworkWorld)
* Apple notebook popularity miscalculated. Hey, since I'm doing this on a Mac right now, it can't have been miscalculated that much. But according to Macwoirld, the unit volume for Apple notebooks has slipped from the third quarter to the fourth quarter. Ooooooh. (Source: PC World)
* Another tack on click fraud: Lawyers. So Google is looking at alternate approaches (see yesterday's post). But Yahoo just announced they're creating a Click Fraud Czar position. They're promoting one of their old-time lawyers to the position, dubbed Vice President of Marketplace Quality. Can you say 'absolutely no real job security whatsover'? I can. Pooor schmuck. (Source: CNET)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 22, 2007 08:20 AM

March 21, 2007 | Comments: (0)

InfoWorld LIVE! #8: Linux and SMB

Actually, it's episode #9, but last week's was a rerun seeing as how I had to attend the InfoWorld editorial retreat.

This week, however, we delve into Linux and SMB. So we have a long talk with Xandros' Erich Forler. Xandros is one of the more popular small-biz Linux desktops and they just came out with a new modular server product that's supposed to be highly similar to Windows to make things easier on IT admins. Oh yeah, and Sasquatch Venezia chimes in with his benighted views.

You can download this week's episode by clicking on this link: Listen!

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 21, 2007 01:35 PM

March 21, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/21

* TrueCrypt 4.3 released. Okay, Vista has BitLocker, but that's not the be-all of encryption. TrueCrypt is a Windows-only encryption package that now handles 32- and 64-bit Windows, it's optimized for USB and other external devices and can now handle a FAT32 volume of up to 2TB. Oh yeah--and it's free. (Source: Slashdot)

* Azaleos updates OneServer for Exchange 2007. So we looked at this during our managed Exchange roundup. Now it's updated for Exchange 2007, including support for up to 1000 users as well as a blade server config. (Source: Azaleos)

* Adtran does a new VoIP gateway for SMBs. Hey, VoIP is here to stay and Adtran knows it. The new NetVanta 1355 handles SIP gateway functionality, advanced routing, Power over Ethernet (PoE) switching, security, Layer 3 Quality of Service (QoS) and survivability features for about $3,300. (Source: Adtran)

* Netgear does new PoE switch for SMBs. I've got a similar one from Linksys here at the house, but you'll read about that one in an upcoming review. Netgear's is a new ProSafe model aimed at giving PoE to things like VoIP phone. (Source: Network Computing)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 21, 2007 09:47 AM

March 20, 2007 | Comments: (0)

FreeConference vs. Evil Empire--Minor Spat or Net Neutrality Behemoth?

This has been making the rounds since late last week. Seems that there's a service in the mid-west called FreeConference.com. These guys are a rural-ISP free-calling operation. Their main sale was letting folks (especially small businesses) conduct conference calls for free--or at least only for the price of a typical long distance call.

Last week, Cingular/AT&T, Qwest and Sprint were accused of blocking FreeConference.com for their cell phone customers. (A Cingular/AT&T spokesperson actually confirmed it last Thursday (thanks Kap).) Callers who attempted to use the service received a message saying the service didn't function on that particular network and were then routed to customer service--presumably to be offered conference calling services from these major carriers for additional cost, of course.

Black & white case of evil empire on independent operator? Well let's see. The reason that FreeConference is in the mid-west (Iowa to be precise) is because they run an operation much like a 900 number operator. Rural phone companies tend to charge much-inflated termination fees for calls (that's the charge that the local phone company charges the long distance company for placing calls to wireless numbers in its purview). Usually, these are less than a penny per minute where I live near a major urban center. But in places like Iowa, they've been blown up to 7 cents per minute or more. Ouch.

So guys like FreeConference come in and take advantage of this price buffer to invent services that look free on the surface but still have plenty of money changing hands as long as they negotiate the right deals. So does this make FreeConference a legit target for Evil Empire nuking?

According to Cingular/AT&T, the answer is 'yes' because in the case of FreeConference, AT&T could be forced to pay the termination fees for multiple parties in a con call, while FreeConference and its customers skate. So they're justified in simply blocking the service in order to prevent this possible dent on their ever-precious bottom lines.

According to Oliver, however, the answer is "HELL, #$%@ING NO!" These price discrepancies are INVENTED by the phone companies, for crying out loud. As such, they've created these opportunities. Merely because FreeConference takes advantage of them doesn't give AT&T the right to block any service they happen to dislike.

There's a place where these types of grievances can be aired and resolved: It's called the FCC, and AT&T will no doubt get a much better reception there than FreeConference would.

The simple black and white fact is that this should have gone through the courts before the phone companies were allowed to take this kind of action. Allowing cell carriers, Internet backbone providers or similar resource providers carte blanche control over the content running on these networks is blatantly bad for the e-economy as a whole, hugely negative for millions of small businesses looking for the best deals available, a kick in the crotch for Internet as an independent international community and my ulcer specifically.

FCC: Where are you when we need you?!

'Nuff said.

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 20, 2007 02:15 PM

March 20, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/20

* Microsoft gets into software PBX. The Microsoftees are holding their 2nd-annual Small Business Summit. And one of their announcements is the Microsoft Response Point phone system A software PBX (also available as a hardware appliance most likely) with several compatible phones from D-Link, Quanta, and Uniden. Looks like I've got a blog review coming. (Source: InfoWorld)
* More Microsoft small biz deals. Another announcement at the Small Business Summit is a plug for the Windows Advantage program. If small businesses are willing to validate their Microsoft licenses in this way, Microsoft will give them deals on its credit reporting service and Office OneNote 2003. 2003? What about 2007?!?! (Source: PC World)
* The Evil Empire details its plans. The real evil empire, Verizon, detailed their technology plans this week, including carrier upgrade plans and new initiatives for wired/wireless convergence. Oh yeah, and new ways to over charge us for stuff the rest of the world had five years ago. (Source: NetworkWorld)
* Apptix gets into voice, too. The company best known for its hosted Exchange services, also just announced a new on-demand VoIP service, that should make buying voice for your SMB as buying a book on Amazon. We'll see. (Source: Small Business Computing)
* Novell outlines new features for SUSE 10 and new workgroup tools. It's BrainShare time again, so except several Novell announcements. First there's a Service Pack for SUSE Linux Enterprise 10--new stuff, including Xen virtualization, high-availability storage and support for quad-core CPUs. On the workgroup side, it's called Novell Teaming + Conferencing. (Not sure about that 'Teaming' name, but what the hell). Basically a LiveMeeting clone (voice, Web real-time collab & instant messaging) but it apparetnly doesn't need GroupWise on the back-end so you can breathe easy. (Source: Novell)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 20, 2007 10:30 AM

March 19, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/19

* Spyware to get a slap in the face. It's called the Internet Spyware (I-Spy) Prevention Act, and it was introed last week by Representatives Zoe Lofgren (Democrat, CA) and Bob Goodlatte (Republican, VA). It passed the House back in 2005, but the Senate never acted on it. Back in play, and lawmakers vow this time spyware bad guys will pay. was one of two bills that passed the U.S. House of Representatives in May 2005. (Source: InfoWorld)
* Intuit revamps QuickBooks Developer Network. According to Intuit, the Intuit Developer Network started out with just 60 apps. Now it's at 400 with almost 12,000 developers working. So they've revamped the membership program and added lots of new info, including the much-awaited Vista-compatibility docs. (Source: Intuit)
* Loads of new stuff from Skype. A laundry list: Skype 3.1 for Windows, a new four-person Skype PBX for small business, and they've started their own marketplace (eBay synergy?), called SkypeFind. Pretty cool stuff. (Sources: PC World, InformationWeek)
* New version of Red Hat also a 'mega patch'. Turns out Red Hat's newest Linux distro not only carries a new platform, it also fixes upwards of 40 bugs in previous versions--some rated critical. All the more reason to upgrade, hmmm? (Source: ZDNet)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 19, 2007 10:35 AM

March 17, 2007 | Comments: (0)

ZoneMinder Digital Surveillance Systems

Security is the utmost for any business, whether it is securing your data, or securing your doors. One often overlooked (or under thought) area of security is a camera system. Most people that consider one don't really know their options and immediately settle for a standard CCTV VCR/DVR based camera system.

Digital recording systems have been a great addition to this market by introducing many new tools and features. One of the most notable is the ability to access video data remotely, via a network connection. Access to a network also allows for remote backups and use of either standard or IP cameras. They also make it easier to control recording schedules or set up motion capturing. Of course, all these features come at a cost.

That's where ZoneMinder comes in. This freely available, Linux based, open source camera monitoring software can easily turn a PC into a monitoring system that compares to a $1,500+ PC based DVR. It has built in flexibility of allowing calls to shell scripts or external programs creating infinite possibilities of integration into other systems. The video and image processing make it very flexible and useful in a wide variety of installations.

ZoneMinder can monitor standard cameras (via a capture card or other device such as USB, firewire, etc.) and remote IP based cameras. Any IP based camera that uses MJPEG streams or has an interface to a single JPEG image will work. It also has the ability to monitor images from a file, if there is no other way to access the image. This can be accomplished with cameras that have an FTP function, though I recommend using a different camera setup if possible (due to security and quality of video). Any camera can be set up for monitoring, recording, motion detection or a combination of the three.

Each captured frame is compared against previous frames in the buffer and checked for differences. If the amount of change is greater than the percent of change defined in the options, an event will be triggered. Depending on the camera settings, events can start recordings, send email alerts, or run an external script. This is enhanced by the ability to filter the captured frame through zone filters that qualify the motion as an event. This is an incredibly useful feature when you are monitoring a high traffic area with a single point of interest, such as a door next to a front window or a register at a busy counter. This helps reduce the number of false alarms.

ZoneMinder is web based for ease of accessibility and can be secured with firewalls, Apache htaccess, and SSL common to the Linux system that it runs on, as well as default authentication which provides multi level user access. It can be configured to FTP videos for remote archiving, X.10 home automation, and even has an xHTML interface that can be accessed from mobile devices. Its open design and ability to call external programs allow for integration into almost any existing system.

ZoneMinder is a low cost alternative to higher priced DVR systems and still has the features and flexibility. A LiveCD is available if you don’t have the hardware to dedicate to a test system. You can get a full list of features and the LiveCD at zoneminder.com. So, if you are even considering a surveillance system, then you definitely need to check out the ZoneMinder site.

Justin Brink
q!Bang Solutions

Posted by Josh Kuo on March 17, 2007 01:10 PM

March 16, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Sneak Peek: Windows Mobile 6 Means More Pricey Cell Phones

Figured this would happen. Windows Mobile 6 is coming out, so are cell phone makers going to use it to make lower-cost-but-smarter mobile comm devices...or are they going to use it as an excuse to make Windows versions of the iPhone and charge all us lemmings a bundle for them?

Well, if it's E-Ten Communications' turn to speak, then it's definitely the latter as evidenced by their newly announced and desperately-named Glofiish X800 (not a misspelling). Quad-band, tablet-style, 640-by-480 display, 3.5G-compatible, Bluetooth 2, WiFi, built-in GPS, and a 2 megapixel digi-cam with zoom and autofocus. They're billing it as an 'ultra-thin' but judging by the photos, I'm not sure that's accurate.

Cost? $850 $900 depending on model, available in Q2. Showing at CeBit if you happen to be over there.

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 16, 2007 02:09 PM

March 16, 2007 | Comments: (0)

SMB Tech News Today; 3/16

Back from InfoWorld's 2007 Editorial Retreat. Back from sunny 70-degree weather to NJ where we just got another six or seven inches of gray slushy snow. Sigh.

* Microsoft pumping up online CRM. Mr. Ballmer took this week's Convergence show in San Diego to give a proper sales pitch for Dynamics CRM Live. 'Course the demo was all pre-release code, but that's nothing new. (Source: InfoWorld)
* Cisco to buy WebEx for mucho bucks. Looks like Cisco wants in on the Web 2.0 game, too. Just announced intention to buy WebEx for $3.2 billion. So if you're a WebEx user, might be a good time to look at alternatives...just in case. (Source: ComputerWorld)
* Netgear customers, get set for a software change. For those SMBs using Netgear firewalls, VPN aggregators, etc., get set for a software change. Netgear just did a deal where it will be switching over to software built by security software vendor, TeamF1, in its next-generation of hardware. No word yet on whether older users will get free upgrades or not. (Source: TeamF1)
* Red Hat isn't the only one with new Linux. Xandros used this week's CeBit show in Germany to announce some upgrades to its new SMB-centric Xandros Linux Server 2.0. We've got new backup options, OpenDoc-compatible collaboration & Scalix 11 integration among other things. (Source: Xandros)
* More SMB CeBit news from SAP. Another CeBit SMB announcement comes from SAP. Known for big momma enterprise software, SAP's latest announcement is new SMB versions of its ERP/CRM suites via its SAP All-In-One package. (Source: CNET)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 16, 2007 12:09 PM

March 14, 2007 | Comments: (0)

REVIEW: Gateway M685-E Desktop Replacement Notebook

I just oozed over the Gateway M255-E as our Favorite Value Notebook of 2006. But Gateway didn't stop with the M255-E. The company also sent us the M685-E very late in 2006 and we've been banging on it ever since. At first glance, this looks like one of those jumbo media notebooks meant more as a portable TiVo than a work machine; but the M685-E is aimed square at the business set. Though it could have used just a little more juice in that department, considering its size.

THE SPEC SHEET
The spec sheet is big, which is fitting because the notebook is, too. A 17-inch display dictates the machine's size; and this can be had in either 1680x1050 or 1440x900-capable modes or an upgraded 17.1-inch 1920x1200 version.

CPU is Intel Core 2 Duo running between 1.66GHz-2.16GHz with a RAM complement between 512MB and 4GB depending on your inclination. Hard disks start at 80GB and skim up to 120GB, though if you're a 7200rpm fanatic, you'll be limited to 100GB.

External hooks include 802.11a/b/g, a wired 10/100/1000 Ethernet port, 4 USB ports, a FireWire port, VGA & S-Video out ports, full audio input/output, a 6-in-1 mem card reader and a Type II PC Card slot. Oh, and the usual options of CD or CD-R/DVD or CD-R/DVD-R optical drives.

Overall, this makes for a highly capable platform that Gateway still manages to sell for a nice price (starting under $2K). However, the company bills the M685-E as its 'Ultimate' laptop workstation. Hmmm. I can see why they'd say that, but if that's the case, I might have expected a few other things:

Digital video port. This is a business-oriented machine, so I'm not expecting Windows Media Center extensions; but I would have liked to see a digital display port instead of or in addition to the VGA port for a higher-end display. The M685-E's video card could certainly handle it.

An ExpressCard slot. Hey, PC Card Type II is okay for now, but a box this muscled is going to be around tomorrow and that's going to be ExpressCard's domain.

A webcam. Yeah, it's a biz machine, but there's so much happening with video chat and soft phones, more and more people are using these things for even in-house communications. Not critical, however, but a nice-to-have.

Integrated WWAN. If it's one thing I liked about Dell's giant workstation notebook (the Precision M90), it was the integrated support for a wireless broadband data network, like EVDO or EDGE. I certainly would have liked to see it in the M255-E, since that's far more mobile than the M685, but as long as they're bantering the 'Ultimate' tag...

Still no Vista on this machine, which is actually fine, tho I would like to at least see it offered as an option. We installed an RTM copy of Vista as part of our test and the M685 handled it with no problems. Drivers weren't an issue and the video system was more than strong enough to deliver the whole Vista graphics experience. However, Gateway still isn't offering the OS as an option on its site, which means they're waiting until the list of Vista-compatible business applications reaches an acceptable level--like most PC makers.

THE DAY-TO-DAY
I used the Gateway M685-E as a day-to-day machine for a couple of months. The biggest problem I had was the...bigness. This is really a honker. So much so, I had to temporarily move to a different notebook knapsack as my regular one was just too small. Ironically, the size was even more of a problem than the weight. Gateway has done a decent job keeping this machine's weight around 7 and a half pounds as long as you stick with the standard battery. Jump to a long-life power cell and you're well over 8 pounds.

And while we're on it, basic battery life was nothing to brag about or sneeze at. With a standard battery doing standard work in battery saver mode, you're looking at about 2-2.5 hours. Jump that to watching full-screen movies and you're going to get significantly less. We didn't get a chance to test the long-life battery, but all reports indicate this should almost double the standard battery's capacity.

Aside from its size, however, the M685-E was a stellar performer. It should have been since we got the Core 2 Duo 2.16GHz CPU with 2GB of RAM. That let me run XP and a variety of virtual machines, a full install of Vista and it probably would have run Fedora 6 with all the eye candy extensions if Gateway hadn't wanted it back.

Gateway's case construction looks great, but your first few contacts with the machine may make you think it's weak. But that isn't the case. It's not a Toughbook--meaning I wouldn't drop the M685-E, but for day-to-day wear and tear, the construction was a good balance between solidity and weight management.

Hey, if you need a work-oriented desktop replacement at a great price then the M685-E is a good choice. Rabid travelers and those who want home media capabilities, however, probably need to look at another machine.

M685-E
Gateway Computers
Price: $1985 (base)
Pros: Very strong PC performer, loads of connectivity options and full Vista compatibility
Cons: No ExpressCard support, no WWAN support.

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 14, 2007 10:45 AM

March 14, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Today in SMB Tech; 3/14

* Want Linux? Tell Dell. Seems Dell is taking user requests about Linux seriously and querying users to see if it really is a viable move. If you want to let them know how you feel, take the survey here. (Source: InfoWorld)
*Samsung boosts mobile phone storage to 8GB. Pretty much says it all: big memory boost. Though the article says this means your phone could store over 2000 songs. Then again, there's no comparable improvement in battery technology, so you still can't play more than 45 minutes worth of music before your phone hangs up on you. (Source: PC World)
*Microsoft announces winner of Ultimate Challenge. In case you missed it, Ultimate Challenge was Microsoft's challenge to small biz entrepreneurs to come up with the best/coolest small biz technology idea. The winner is the Mayhem Poets who now get $100K towards starting their combination social site and performance art venue. (Source: Microsoft)
* Red Hat looking to lead Linux again. Red Hat is officially intro-ing Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5. It's been about two years since Red Hat really did anything with RHEL, so it'll be a welcome upgrade. And, one worth checking into for SMBs interested in virtualization--though Red Hat is adding license limitations here that will curtail how many VMs a basic RHEL5 machine can run. Not sure how that's going to go over in the Penguin community. (Source: CNET)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 14, 2007 10:01 AM

March 13, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Today in SMB Tech

* Microsoft gets closer to Dynamics. Get set for a load of SMB (with an emphasis on 'medium-sized') announcements from Microsoft regarding its Dynamics line. Products a'comin, Office 2007 integration, and user communities, too. (Source: InfoWorld)
* ERP still not dead. Did you think ERP was dead? Nope. The concept remains alive in versions like Dynamics as well as more vertical jobs. AND it's moving into SMBs according to a new Aberdeen report. (Source: TechTarget)
* Novell reveals RedMojo buyout. Novell just can't market themselves. They build cool stuff then hide it. Now they're making moves in virtualization, and we only found out because they leaked it in a quarterly report. Seems they've bought virtualization management firm RedMojo, so we can look for that to be integrated into Novell's virtualization offerings by end of year. (Source: NetworkWorld)
* OneCare still in trouble. Not only does it finish dead last behind its competitors in a recent Austrian anti-virus study, now users of Microsoft's much-maligned OneCare platform are saying it's STILL deleting emails despite Microsoft having issued a fix for this problem. (Source: ComputerWorld)

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 13, 2007 09:53 AM

March 12, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Call for Stupid User Tricks

Yep, we're hitting this topic again this year. I've already got a sizeable chunk of these reserved, but I wanted to open the door for more reader input like we had last year.

The call is the same: send me your anecdotes with as much personal information about yourself as you'd like--from anonymous to name, rank and serial number.

Anecdotes should concern moves that a user(s) made that did something to the network at large (crashed a server, burned up a printer, opened a security hole, etc.). In other words something a user did that just ruined a system administrator's day. Follow that with what you learned from this experience.

Winners get their anecdote published in the online & print story and an InfoWorld backpack--provided you provide shipping info. Get'em to me by the end of next week.

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 12, 2007 01:42 PM

March 12, 2007 | Comments: (0)

REVIEW: Iomega StorCenter Pro 150d

Okay, I just spent a few days dissing my Iomega 500GB StorCenter shared network hard disk because it suddenly started flaking on me after about 8 months of use. That didn't daunt Iomega, however, which sought to reclaim my mindshare by getting us a hands-on period with their new 1TB StorCenter Pro 150d.

The gist of this new StorCenter is that its a full-fledged NAS, in fact a close sibling of the Windows Storage Server-based StorCenter 200d. The 150d includes an automatic hook to Active Directory, and brings you most of the 200d's functionality along with a terabyte of data storage for about $800 (though you can get a 2TB version for more bucks). This is done with fewer hardware options (though you still have the USB connector so you can back up to a REV drive, for example) and a management interface based on Linux.

The Active Directory integration intrigued me because Iomega made a big point out of the fact that this is brainless, even though the StorCenter Pro 150d is based on Linux firmware. So I sent the thing to Brian Chee at the ANCL Lab in Hawaii so he could plug it into the Fergenschmeir domain, which is InfoWorld's Microsoft-only test network.

Brian turned my scoffing into silence, however, after he confirmed most of what Iomega promised. While hooking to the AD server had a wrinkle because both the NAS and the AD server need to be within 5 minutes of each other, that got fixed quickly with a manual clock change.

After that, the Iomega found the network's DHCP server; it then joined the Fergenschmeir AD domain in a couple of minutes and setup a basic share in yet a minute or two more. All done, access accomplished. It took a little extra time to figure out how to setup an NFS share, which proved to be more involved than simply clicking the checkbox (Iomega has some work to do there). But after that was working, Brian was able to connect not just to Windows machines, but Macs and Linux boxes as well.

The whole thing is managed through a Web interface that works as well in Firefox as it does in IE. Most everything is accomplished via checkboxes. The interface goes through setup options, user access controls and disk health. User access goes through local users, local groups as well as users and groups culled from the AD server. You can get alerts via the Interface or via email.

There's even a general backup utility for backing up the entire NAS to a CIF share. All these controls are there and certainly easier to use than many other interfaces. But if anything goes wrong, our experience is still that you'll need to know what you're doing to get it fixed.

Even so, Iomega has done a good job of balancing advanced capabilities with a need for KISS (keep it simple stupid). For example, the StorCenter supports jumbo frames, but the option isn't turned on by default because many switches still don't support it which is a headache that neophyte users don't need.

Flip side to that, tho. Iomega tried to make NTP a one-click option, but if your AD server isn't handling NTP then the checkbox just sits there non-functioning with no real explanation. Also don't like the fact that only one person can be in the management interface at a time and that any attempts to connect to it via a VPN connection died hard.

So is it easy or not? It is, as long as nothing goes wrong. Sticking the 150d into an small SMB network shouldn't give you any trouble based on our experience. Performance was solid and getting something besides a Windows machine to access it, while not brain-dead easy, also isn't rocket science, either. So far, we'd recommend it.

StorCenter Pro 150d
Iomega
Base price: $800
Pros: Real simple, real easy, real quiet, truly hot-swappable drives
Cons: One-person access to the management interface, needs more granularity in user permissions, no access to management interface via VPNs.

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 12, 2007 10:39 AM

March 07, 2007 | Comments: (0)

InfoWorld LIVE! #7: VoIP and...more VoIP

And, yup, we're extending our InfoWorld LIVE! series beyond six weeks. So sue me. This week it's all about Voice over IP. Is it right for you? Is it right for me? Does it have a future? Do I have a future?

To answer these questions and more, we've got guests from Packet 8 and Linksys, and after that Sasquatch Venezia gets to wax geek on all that Asterisk stuff that's been driving his wife nuts. Check it out.

You can download this week's episode by clicking on this link: Listen!

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 7, 2007 11:48 AM

March 05, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Awesome Desktop Support Gadget

So the Iomega StorCenter network hard disk flaked out this weekend. I get freaked when hard disks flake out because you never know when they're just going to die entirely. And while I had most of the work data in other places, I had about 60GB of media data that wasn't anywhere else--just got lazy and didn't setup a tertiary backup system at home. My bad. Spank me. As long you're someone hot.

So there's piecemeal data grabbing off the StorCenter and onto a Windows XP box. Didn't look at that box first and suddenly filled the disk after 35GB or so. Now I have to get stuff off that one onto another one so I can keep emptying the shared disk. It's like Greek tragedy--if the Greeks were wearing propeller beanies.

And that's when I remembered this cool little gadget I picked up at CES in January: The Tornado. Tres cool.

Think of a cable coil device with a USB 2.0 connector at either end. Nothing special there. But hook it up between two Windows XP machines and it pops up its own file transfer tool. Each window sees the disk tree of both machines. Find what you want on one and then drag-and-drop or cut-and-paste to the other machine.
View screenshot
It's not revolutionary but it is really handy. Fast way to go from one PC to another. No muss no fuss. The version I picked up goes from XP or 2000 to XP or 2000. No Vista on that job, but supposedly the newest Tornados do support Vista. Want one of those 'cause you know you'll be doing that migration job a few dozen times in the next year. $60 from the manufacturer's Web site.

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 5, 2007 12:16 PM

March 02, 2007 | Comments: (0)

InfoWorld LIVE! #6: Challenges for Today's Technology Entrepreneurs

And here's another episode of InfoWorld LIVE! radio. This week it's all about technology startups. The challenges we're facing today vs. the easy times of gravy and gold from ten years ago. My co-host shares his technology lawyer wisdom, I represent the middle-aged but still struggling startup via FB2, Bryan Cheung of Liferay reps the successful startup, q!Bang's High Mobley is the man from the brand new baby startup, and the smart and lovely Linda Musgrove from Tradeshow Teacher talks about the importance of marketing. Check it out.

You can download this week's episode by clicking on this link: Listen!

Posted by Oliver Rist on March 2, 2007 03:38 PM

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