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Christmas Shopping Recommendations

The 2011 Version

Posted 11/17/2011

Each year, we put out our recommendations for those looking to put a new computer under the tree for that special someone. This year, we recommend:

Item	Desktop	Laptop
Processor	2nd Generation Intel Core i3, i5, or i7
Memory (RAM)	4 - 8 GB	2 - 6 GB
Hard Drive Size	640 GB, 750 GB, 1 TB (ie. 1000 GB)	250 GB, 320 GB, 500 GB
Windows 7	>4GB of Memory must use 64-bit, <=4GB, either is OK
Display	19" Widescreen or larger	15.6" - 17" (10" if Netbook)
Office 2010	Starter Edition or Home and Student

Office 365 Now Available

Office Web Apps, Email, SharePoint & Lync

Posted 9/10/2011

Microsoft Office 365 is ready to go. We're using it here in-house (Plan E3) and have found it to be very easy to use and administer. Office 365 lets businesses without a dedicated Information Technology (IT) department do things that would have been either too difficult or too expensive in the past. It even works with your smartphone, whether it's based on Windows Mobile, iPhone/iPad, Nokia (Symbian), Android 2.0, Palm OS, or Blackberry 4.0 and above. For more information on smartphone support, see this article at Microsoft's website.

One of the ways we use it here is as a file repository for projects. With the Sharepoint workspace, I'm able to keep a synchronized copy of everything I need on my laptop and work on it whether I'm connected to the Internet or not. What's more, if I save a file to the Sharepoint workspace while I'm offline, it will synchronize with the website as soon as an Internet connection becomes available.

We also use it for a company calendar. I've connected our company calendar in Sharepoint to my personal Outlook 2010 calendar. That allows me to see both calendars side-by-side and put my calendar informaton where others in the company can see it. Not only that, they can also add and change the entries on the calendar, and that information is synchronized to my computer automatically. Once, I even used that feature to copy a picture from one computer to another.

Previous versions of Outlook would let you add a Sharepoint calendar, but it wouldn't automatically remind you of appointments on it. Further, it could only be edited from Sharepoint. With this incarnation of Sharepoint/Outlook integration, both of these limitations are gone. The Sharepoint calendar information can be freely edited from inside Outlook or Sharepoint, and it will alert you when the online calendar's events come due.

The specific features available from within Office 365 depend upon the plan you choose. Currently, I see a total of 19 different plans to choose from, ranging in cost from $2-$27/month - and that doesn't even include plans for educational institutions. I've included a selection of plans below, with links to a free trial offer for each. You can mix and match plans to meet your needs. (Limits may apply)

	Plan
Feature	P1 (Max 50 users)	K2	E3	Office 2010 Plus
Exchange Online (25GB Total, 25MB Attachments)	ü		ü
Exchange Online (500MB Total)		ü
Sharepoint Online (Document/Info sharing, public-facing websites)	ü	ü	ü
Lync Online (Instant Messaging, Presence, and Online Meetings)	ü	ü	ü
Office Web Apps (Viewing/basic editing of Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and OneNote documents)	ü
Email Antivirus/Antispam Protection (Forefront Online Protection for Exchange)	ü	ü	ü
Microsoft Office Professional Plus Desktop Applications			ü	ü
Cost/License/Month	$6	$10	$24	$12
30-day Trials	Get Trial (10 licenses)	Get Trial (25 licenses)	Get Trial (25 licenses)	Get Trial (25 licenses)

Give us a call for more info or click the links above to try it out.

Online Backup for Business Available

Protect your data with our service

Posted 7/22/2011

Your data is the lifeblood of your business. In fact, studies show that most businesses that suffer a major data loss fail within the following year. We have a service that can help you keep your business safe from data loss. We can back up your data off-site so that you can sleep knowing that your data is safe.

Pricing is per year and is based upon the total amount of data stored in gigabytes (GB) as follows:

From (GB)	To (GB)	Price
0	250	$229.00
250	500	$599.00

An extra 50GB runs $45/year, and if you need an extra 100GB, that's available for $88/year. If you start with the lower price plan and exceed that amount, you'll be billed for the difference 60 days later. That way, you have an opportunity to reduce the amount you're backing up before the rate increase goes into effect.

We accept Visa, Mastercard, Discover, American Express, ACH Payments, Checks and Cash. Can you afford not to have a service like this?

We Beat Dell®... Again!

Our business-class computers beat their price!

Posted 7/4/2011

An all-too-little-known fact is that our computers are priced competitively against Dell's. Generally speaking, when you price out a Dell computer with a 3-year onsite warranty, and then add delivery and setup, there isn't usually more than about $20 difference between our prices. Well, this time there's a big difference. Last Thursday, we got an ad in the mail for their OptiPlex 990 at a good price:$789. I wondered how our BizPro Q67 would stack up against this system, so I spec'ed one out... apples to apples (sort of). Their specs and ours are shown below.

Second-Generation Intel Core i3 Processor	Second-Generation Intel Core i5 Processor
3GB DDR3 1333 MHz	4GB DDR3 1333 MHz
500GB Hard Drive	500GB Hard Drive
18x DVD Burner	22-24x DVD Burner
Genuine Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium	Genuine Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium
Three-year onsite warranty	Three-year onsite warranty
Their Price: $789	Our Price: $706

It may be a cliché but... Why Pay More?

Share and Share Alike

Microsoft SharedView Helps Teams Work Together

Posted 2/24/2011

Microsoft has a tool that I've just recently discovered that can help people in far-flung locations share and collaborate on documents. It's one of the many programs that replaces the old NetMeeting program. It's the cool gadget on Tech Tip Friday this week and here's what we'll be saying about it:

...SharedView is a program that lets you share applications with your work team. This is a great tool for folks who don’t office together, but still need to work together on documents and what have you. With this free download which, by the way, requires a Windows Live account to use, you can share whatever you’re up to with up to 15 different participants. Each of them has a different color mouse so that participants can point around on the screen and everyone can see what is happening. It also adds a “Work with me” toolbar to Microsoft Office applications. Here’s how it works. You start the program, which puts a big bar at the top of the screen. Then, to create a session, you sign in with your Live ID, and then send invitations to the session. You can send invitations by email, you can send a link, or they can just join with your email address and a password generated by the program. The folks you invite do have to have SharedView installed, but fortunately it’s free, so that’s no big deal. You can add handouts that your participants can download if they like, and once folks join in, you can share any currently open application with them. If you are the host of the session, you get to drive. In other words, everyone else can only just see what you’re doing. They can request to take control of the application and if you agree, then they can make changes to the document. In Word, these changes can all be tracked, and you have the capability of reasserting control at any time. You also have a chat box into which you can type messages that go to everyone else in the session and appear as small popups on their screens.

Get this cool, free tool right here.

Office 2010 Preinstalled on All New Computers

Office Starter 2010 now standard equipment

Posted 1/26/2011

Microsoft has long offered two suites of productivity applications: Microsoft Office for business use and Microsoft Works for home use. Computers have often been preloaded with the productivity suite that best fit the intended audience of the computer. The biggest problem with that approach, one which should never have existed in my opinion, was the difficulty of using documents created in one suite with the other suite's programs. Usually this meant converting Works documents to use in Office applications. The best option was to save documents in a format common to both applications, but this meant not being able to use all the features of your chosen suite. Later Works Suites included Microsoft Word. Now, Microsoft Works is gone entirely.

Microsoft Works has been replaced by Microsoft Office Starter 2010. Most users expect some kind of productivity software with capabilities greater than those of WordPad to be preloaded on new computers. Office Starter 2010 includes reduced-functionality versions of Word and Excel which include advertising. It does not include Powerpoint or Outlook. When you first run Office 2010, you may choose whether to use Office Starter 2010, or a full Office 2010 suite (Home & Student, Home & Business, or Professional) To use the full suite without ads, you must purchase either a Product Key Card or a traditional disc. Either option will allow you to activate any of the 3 full suites previously mentioned, but the advantage of the traditional disc is that while any Product Key Card (or PKC) will activate one license on one computer, the traditional disc for Home & Student will activate one license on three different computers in one household and the traditional disc for both Home & Business and Professional will activate one license on two different computers, intended to be one desktop and one laptop.

How do you know if Office Starter 2010 is right for you? You can check this page at Microsoft's website to find out the limitations of Word Starter 2010, and you can check this page at Microsoft's website to find out the limitations of Excel Starter 2010.

What Should I Look For In A Computer?

Our Recommendations...

Posted 12/3/2010

'Tis the season to look for a new computer. So, with all the deals you are going to be bombarded with this Christmas season, what should you be looking for? Well, if you're looking for a laptop, you would probably want to choose from one of the top four brands worldwide. Those brands are Dell, HP, Lenovo, and Acer. Dell and HP swap spots from time to time between #1 and 2, and Lenovo and Acer swap spots between #3 and 4. Be aware that Acer also owns both the Gateway and eMachines brands, so when you buy one of these, your experience won't necessarily be the same as if you've bought one of these brands before.

Brand isn't so important when it comes to desktop systems, rather the specifications are what's important. We recommend the following minimum specifications:

Windows 7 Home Premium 32- or 64-bit
3GB (gigabytes) of RAM Memory, if more than 4, your Windows will definitely be 64-bit
320GB of Hard Disk space, more is better
Intel® Pentium™, Core i3™, or i5 or AMD® Athlon® processor

We have experienced some problems using the 64-bit version of Windows with some older hardware. We've also seen some issues between this version and iTunes that we haven't yet solved. The 32-bit version doesn't seem to be afflicted with these issues.

We hope this will help you as you make your selections.

Increase Your PC Purchase Power With Free Hardware

A word from Microsoft...

Posted 9/11/2010

Value Advantage for State/Local Government increases your purchase value by giving you FREE hardware peripherals chosen especially for you when you buy eligible PCs preinstalled with Genuine Windows 7® Professional or Windows 7 Ultimate. This is an offer designed to reward customers like you who make volume PC purchases. Your first award comes with a minimum of 10 PCs purchased and the more PCs you buy the more hardware you get for free.

It’s a limited time offer until September 30, 2010.

In these times when maximizing every budget dollar is so critical the Value Advantage for State/Local Government offer delivers true value. The hardware earned can very quickly get into several thousands of dollars value. You can even mix and match your awards from among valuable peripherals such as flash drives, external hard drives and projectors.

Go to http://microsoftmore.com/offer/vertical/ for complete offer details.

Abandoned System Policy Announced

Affects Systems Received by DAConsult for Service

Posted 7/17/2010

From time to time it happens that people abandon their computers. We will consider a computer system as abandoned if after completing the work we were asked to perform, the computer remains in our office over 30 days. This policy applies to all computers received by David Anderson Consulting and does not require us to contact you. We try, but if you don't get the message, we can't be held responsible. Abandoned systems will become ours to do with as we please.

Rate Increases Announced

Economic issues necessitate change

Posted 6/23/2010

We've long weathered the economic cycles that plague every business. In fact, the last time we raised our service rates was when gasoline hit $2.00/gallon. It had remained steady for five years or so prior to that. We were always able to keep overhead low and stave off price increases even as we increased the services we've provided. With today's economic situation, we have come to a point where we recognize the need to increase those rates to remain viable for the long term. Therefore, effective July 1, onsite service rates will be as follows:

Residential Client:

Service Call <=15 minutes: $30
Service Call 16 - 60 minutes: $55
Service Call 60+ minutes: $55/hr, billed by the minute.

Business Client:

Service Call <=15 minutes: $35
Service Call 16 - 60 minutes: $75
Service Call 60+ minutes: $75/hr, billed by the minute.

If you are a Business Client and your issue can be handled remotely, Residential rates will apply.

Microsoft Office 2010 is Here

Why should I care?

Posted 6/12/2010

Office 2010 is the latest iteration of Microsoft's flagship productivity suite. The new suite is enhanced with a raft of new features, and lets you work with a PC, over the Web, or on a Windows Mobile smartphone. Take a look at the microsite below for more information.

Support for XP and Vista is expiring...

Are you ready for Windows 7?

Posted 6/8/2010, Updated 6/11/2010

Although Windows XP will be supported until 2014, that won't apply to anything but Service Pack 3 of Windows XP after July 13. Support for Vista without any service packs applied came to an end back on April 13. If you haven't considered Windows 7 yet, please do. Time is not on your side if you wish to remain supported.

Windows 2000 Server support is also ending this month. If you still have Windows 2000 Servers, consider upgrading your hardware to new servers running Windows Server 2008 R2. To help you decide, we've included a Windows Server microsite at the bottom of this article.

For more information from Microsoft about upgrading, http://www.microsoft.com/eos. There, you can download the free Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor to find out whether or not your computer is ready to run Windows 7. You can also compare versions and see which one is right for you or your organization.

Trouble with Flash Player?

Step-By-Step Guide Available

Posted 12/17/2009

We have gotten several questions lately about problems installing the Adobe Flash Player. As a result, we have compiled a step-by-step article that I hope is helpful in getting your troubles with it fixed. You can find the article in the forums right here.

Computer Buying Guide

Specification guidelines for Black Friday Shoppers

Posted 11/24/2009

On the Take Five Tech Tip Friday radio show broadcast on KBJS last week, we gave a quick guide to demystify those computer specifications you'll find in Black Friday ads. The full article is here, but the short version is below.

RAM: 2-6 Gigabytes (GB), bigger is better
Hard Disk Size: 200 Gigabytes - 1 Terabyte (TB), if over 320 Gigabytes, consider a 3 year warranty
Processor: Use the list given in the original article, models lower in the list are more powerful, get the most powerful you can afford
Windows 7: Home Premium for home use, Professional for business use, Ultimate for either

Windows 7 is Awesome...

Windows 7 is the Vista that should have been!

Posted 10/16/2009, Updated 10/22/2009

If you've been keeping up with our opinions of Windows Vista, you'll no doubt be aware we aren't wowed by it. We haven't even seen much reason to upgrade from Windows XP and have been big proponents of the Vista Business to Windows XP Pro downgrade option. Windows 7 changes all that. Windows 7 really is what Vista should have been. It's based on Vista, so if software runs on Vista, it'll run on Windows 7. For that matter, if you have the right versions of Windows 7, you can even run Windows XP in a virtual machine (a simulated computer). This feature is called XP Mode and is a download (more) that works with Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate.

Features of Windows 7 include

Location aware printing: Automatically switch the default printer as you move from work to home and back.
Smarter USB Printer Identification: In the past, if you plugged your printer into a USB port, the computer would recognize the printer and install the driver so you could print. That worked fine. Later, if you unplugged that printer, and forgot which port you plugged it into, it would recognize the printer as a completely different printer, and not make it your default. With Windows 7, if you plug the same printer into another port, Windows still sees it as the same printer.
Homegroups: A new feature that makes sharing files, printers, and media easier when you have more than one computer at home.
Problem Steps Analyzer: Lets you record the steps that cause problems so that technicians can spend more time fixing problems.
Branch Cache: Lets branch offices work faster when files are located back at headquarters.
Direct Access: Lets remote users work as though connected to the corporate network more easily. Also lets network administrators continue to administer computers that aren't onsite.

Windows 7 is available now on new PCs built by David Anderson Consulting, is also available for purchase as an upgrade. Our prices for this new version of Windows are shown after the jump:

Upgrade Version - Requires that your computer already runs another version of Windows - Click the image to buy it from Amazon.com

	Windows® 7 Home Premium
	Windows® 7 Home Premium Family Pack You may install this on up to three computers in your home
	Windows® 7 Professional
	Windows® 7 Ultimate

Full Version - Can be installed on a computer whether it has Windows on it now or not.

	Windows® 7 Home Premium	$199.99
	Windows® 7 Professional	$299.99
	Windows® 7 Ultimate	$319.99

The Future is Ultra-Thin...

New notebook less than 1" thick!

Posted 9/19/2009

Introducing next-generation mobility! David Anderson Consulting has a new thin, light, energy-efficient notebook for you to consider: the IQ13. These are manufactured for us by our supplier partner, ASI. Less than 1" thick with a 13.3" wide screen, the IQ13 is an ideal solution if you need the utmost in mobility and robust multi-purpose performance. Based on the Intel GS45 chipset and featuring the Intel Pentium^® processor SU2700 ULV, the IQ13 uses the same core logic and graphics engine found in today's mainstream notebooks.

Features include

Intel Pentium M SU2700 1.3GHz 2MB Cache 800FSB 64-bit Processor with Speed Step Technology
Intel GS45 Chipset with Intel Integrated VGA, up to 384MB of Dynamic shared VRAM
13.3" LED WXGA Screen (1366x768 - 16:9 Ratio)
3GB of DDR2 800MHz DRAM
120GB 5400rpm 1.8" SATA Hard Drive
Integrated 802.11n wireless and Gigabit LAN
Intel HD Sound 2-Channel
Integrated Bluetooth, Fingerprint reader, and 1.3 Megapixel Webcam
TPM (Trusted Platform Module)
1xUSB, 1x eSATA, 1xHDMI, 1xHeadphone
3-cell battery
1yr warranty standard, parts & labor. Warranty upgrades available to 3yr parts/labor with 24x7 Support
Supports Windows Vista and the upcoming Windows 7. Additionally, when loaded with Vista, this unit has earned WHQL (Windows Hardware Quality Labs) Validation.

Call us for pricing on this unit today: (903) 586-4082

Who we are...

David Anderson Consulting is a leading provider of Computer Systems Integration, Network Design, and Consulting services in Jacksonville Texas.

We are an authorized reseller of Acer products. We are also a member of Microsoft's Partner Program, Netgear's Powershift Partner Program, Seagate's Partner Program, an Intel Channel Partner at the Associate level, a Preferred Western Digital Reseller, an AOC Insite Partner, an Authorized CTX reseller, a Creative Labs System Builder, a Trend Micro Partner, a Targus and an American Power Conversions (APC) Reliability Provider Partner. These alliances give us the broad-based manufacturer support you need to speed resolution of your problems.

Why Choose David Anderson Consulting?

I'm David Anderson, and I've been helping East Texans solve their computing problems in one capacity or another since 1986.

I have nineteen years of networking experience spanning NetWare®, MS-DOS®, and various flavors of Microsoft® Windows™. I was a programmer for a total of 4 years. I've repaired and built computers since 1991. In one job I held, I was also a database administrator for about a year, in addition to other duties. I have been on the faculty of Lon Morris College, and have served as an adjunct faculty member at Tyler Junior College, teaching computer science classes at both.

I hold a Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science from the University of Texas at Tyler. I also have twelve hours of Graduate credit from the same institution.

Networks are our specialty. We provide technical support, desktop and notebook computer systems, servers, upgrades, and remote support services. For more information on the available services we provide, see our services page.