Symantec and Microsoft work better together for virtual environment protection

When customers move to a virtual environment that can change the dynamics of their network and system protection – the best way to make sure that they are safe and sound is to use the best solutions around. Symantec System Recovery Server Edition (formerly Backup Exec System Recovery) is ideal for deployment with Microsoft Hyper-V and other virtual systems. It delivers fast and reliable system recovery that will restore physical and virtual systems in minutes, even to bare metal, dissimilar hardware, remote locations, or virtual environments. With more than 787,000 protected systems, Symantec System Recovery is proven, trusted, and reliable backup server software – and it’s a perfect answer when you need a simple backup solution for newly virtualised systems. Call the Software team or email software@computer2000.co.uk to find out more.

Zenbook UX21E wins coveted CNet Laptop of the Year Award

The ASUS Zenbook UX21E meanwhile has walked away with the highly esteemed title of CNet Laptop of the Year – and little wonder. Measuring only 17mm at the thickest point at the back and tapering down to just 3mm at the front, this amazing piece of hardware is as slim as anything on the market and while it has an 11.5-inch screen, it is only 297mm by 196mm so it is truly ultra-portable. It is machined from a single piece of aluminium, which makes it look absolutely fantastic.

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ASUS Transformer gets rave reviews

The ASUS Transformer Prime is the latest version of the company’s excellent convertible tablet form factor and it’s been going down a storm with reviewers and with buyers alike. One recent review in PC Pro said that the Transformer Prime was ‘an improvement over the original in most respects (and most other Android tablets), with better battery life, a superb screen, a good camera and much slicker design’. Hexus.net described it thus: ‘It is the thinnest and lightest tablet we’ve ever seen, yet it houses a gorgeous Super IPS+ display, a quad-core processor, arguably the best tablet camera, and, when combined with the bundled dock, dual batteries that’ll outlast a flight from London to Singapore’.

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IT spending to increase this year

Gartner says worldwide IT spending will grow by 3.7 percent in 2012, despite the impact of the Eurozone crisis and the Thailand floods. The analyst says total worldwide IT spending will total $3.8 trillion in 2012. The categories it expects to grow fastest are ‘Telecoms Equipment’ (6.9 percent), ‘Enterprise Software’ (6.4 percent), and ‘Computing Hardware’ (5.1 percent).

Metro WiFi boost for London

Mobile operator O2 has announced plans to implement a free WiFi network in central London in time for this summer’s Olympic Games. The service will be provided across the boroughs of Westminster, Kensington and Chelsea. Separately, Nokia is also working on installing a network of wireless hotspots across the capital city and Transport for London has plans to install free access in as many as 120 stations on its network before the summer.

HP appoints new UK&I channel boss

HP has named Pascal Bourguet as Channel Director UK and Ireland of its PSG division. Bourguet was previously head of PSG’s consumer sales team. Paul Hunter, vice president of HP PSG in the UK and Ireland, said: ‘Pascal has done an outstanding job of leading the retail team to help drive the UK PSG business to even greater success in 2012.’ Former HP PSG sales manager Alex Ebeid has taken over Bourguet’s previous role.

Microsoft Datacentre Security & Management Update – February

We’ll start this time with Windows 8, as I’ve mentioned before this release of Microsoft’s server platform will include Hyper-V 3. The feature set has been greatly enhanced to compete with VMware’s Vsphere 5, but don’t forget that Microsoft’s System Centre 2012 suite will be required to provide the management.  In this article there is a direct comparison between the product sets, so you can decide which suits your customer needs best.

The System Centre 2012 suite licensing model was announced this week and Microsoft has listened to the community by simplifying the process. With the present release of the System Centre products there are different licensing models per product and over 100 SKUs in total. With the System Centre 2012 release there are 2 SKUs, for physical and lightly virtualised workloads there is the Standard Edition and for more heavily virtualised workloads there is the Datacentre Edition. Microsoft have produced a “Buyers Guide” website to help you through the process you can also get the datasheet and FAQ.

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The Secret to Effortless Networking Revealed – March 7th 2012

Trends such as Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), mobility, virtualized desktops and unified communications are now being realized.  However, years of adding layers of complexity with every new feature, combined with rising demand for more virtualized environments that enable cloud and support increasing mobility, has impacted the financial and technical performance of the campus LAN.

The campus network has long been the poor relation to where the major innovation and investment has been made within the data centre.  But changes in how users connect, and the kinds of data they are driving back and forth over the network, means the campus network has become critical. Demanding the kind of intelligence already found in data centre networks, solutions that offer effortless deployment and management, scalability, bandwidth, and resilience are required.

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Land of the Giants

HTC’s latest addition to the Windows Mango wave of releases is a true giant amongst smartphones. The Titan has been described as ‘awe-inspiring’ and with its 4.7-inch SLCD display, 8 megapixel camera on the back and a 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera too, it’s ideal for the built-in Skype functionality that comes with Mangos. Inside there’s a single-core 1.5GHz processor, 512MB of RAM and up to 16GB of fixed flash storage – so it packs a performance punch too. And if that’s not enough the HTC Radar provides great all-round functionality in a smaller size – with a 3.8-inch LCD display, 1GHz processor, 5 megapixel rear camera, and up to 8GB storage. For availability on the HTC Titan and Radar contact Brightstar Tech Data now. Also, don’t forget there is the HTC Explorer, which is ideal for customers who want a slightly more compact premium smartphone that runs Android. Its 3.2- inch screen with 480 x 320 resolution is sharp and neat and with a 600MHz processor, it’s a pretty nifty performer too.

Mobile worker population will reach 1.3 billion by 2015

IDC says the world’s mobile worker population will reach 1.3 billion – 37.2 percent of the total workforce – within three years – up from an estimated one billion in 2010. EMEA will see a healthy compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5.6 percent expanding from 186.2 million in 2010 to 244.6 million mobile workers in 2015.