Windows 7 Now Available

You've probably been hearing a lot about Windows® 7 and maybe you're wondering what Windows 7 Professional has that could really make a difference for your small business. With a variety of new features, Windows 7 Professional helps you work faster and more reliably. So what are the new and improved features and enhancements in the new Windows 7 product and why should you upgrade to it?

Performance Improvements: Windows 7 is designed to sleep, resume, and reconnect to your wireless network more quickly. Windows 7 is also designed to run on systems that are "current", meaning you do not necessarily have to upgrade your computers to run this operating system. Performance on a older system is in many cases better than Windows XP performance. Windows 7 also uses smart service use only enabling services that are required at the time therefore making it less memory hungry than Windows Vista.

Power Management: Windows 7 runs with fewer background activities so your PC processor doesn't work as hard and draws less power. Other features include, automatic screen dimming, powering off unused ports, and a more accurate battery-life indicator.

Networking: Windows 7 makes it easy to view and connect to networks on your laptop wherever you go. Just click the networking icon on the taskbar. View Available Networks displays all your wireless and wired options—Wi-Fi, mobile broadband, dial-up, or corporate VPN. One more click, and you're connected

Windows XP Mode: The new Windows XP Mode lets you run older Windows XP business software right on your Windows 7 desktop. This is critical for businesses running older applications allowing you to upgrade without compatibility issues.

Location-Aware Printing: Do you routinely print to multiple printers from your laptop? Now you don't have to manually switch printers when you go from, say, home to work. Windows 7 does it automatically.

BitLocker Drive Encryption: Improved for Windows 7, BitLocker helps keep everything from documents to passwords safer by encrypting the entire drive that Windows and your data reside on. Once BitLocker is turned on, any file you save on that drive is encrypted automatically. This extends to not just your internal hard drive but also USB drives.

Action Center: Action Center consolidates message traffic from key Windows maintenance and security features, including Windows Defender and User Account Control.

These are just some of the new features in Windows 7. For the full list we recommend you visit the Windows 7 Home Page.

For businesses wanting to upgrade from XP without upgrading hardware you can run the Upgrade Adviser on your system to determine if your system can be upgraded.

More information on Windows 7 or for a demo please contact your Comcity Technology Account Manager.

Total Cost of Ownership for I.T. Part 1

Comcity Technology has been reviewing TCO for many of its clients. Conducting detailed calculation of TCO doesn't make much sense for most small businesses, but understanding the true costs, their relative importance and how they can be contained, is critically important. "Cost is what you pay. Value is what you get".

The TCO of typical office PC systems ranges from $3,000 to $10,000 per unit per year. One study found that TCO was 2½ - 3 times the direct cost of hardware, software and support. In other words, for every dollar spent on direct costs, another dollar or two was spent indirectly.

How do you find the right balance between managing costs and optimizing productivity? Active Management of systems can substantially reduce lifetime costs. It is estimated that Unmanged systems can cost $5,867 US a year while Locked & Well Managed systems only cost $3,413 US a year. (Gartner 2008 report).

Over the coming months our newsletter will continue to provide more information on TCO with several parts on this topic. For more information on how Comcity Technology can assist your business in this area please feel free to contact your Account Manager.