MCPc Blog

August Monthly Roundup: Top IT Industry Articles

Today we’re starting a new feature for the MCPc blog — the IT Monthly Roundup, a collection of articles from the previous month that are important, impactful or otherwise of interest to today’s IT professional.

We understand how hard it is to stay up-to-date with all of the news and complexities of our industry so we’re hoping that providing a monthly wrap-up will be useful to you. Let us know what you think and if we missed your favorite article, please share it in the comments below.

Today, we’re taking a look at: the benefits and ROI of Windows 7 upgrades, how virtualization and cloud computing relate to one another, data storage options for varying needs, five ways for network managers to improve efficiency and how Internet-phone providers may change telecommunications.

 

Midsized Companies Migrating to Windows 7 Find the Payback Worthwhile

For CIO Symmetry, Ed Scannell shares the findings of a recent IDC report, which showed that on average, small-to-medium-sized businesses that upgrade to Windows 7 from XP or Vista can see a 100% ROI in 7.2 months.

Additional benefits to Windows 7 deployment, as reported by IDC, include:

• Decrease in IT support needs — an average 65% decrease in PC service desk support hours, 55% drop in PC operating system support hours and 45% drop in PC deployment hours.

• More productivity from end users, due to a reduction in malware, downtime and reboots — resulting in an average of 43 additional productive hours per user, per year.

If you’ve been considering an upgrade to Windows 7, check out Scannell’s article (he links to the IDC report as a PDF download) for more on the potential benefits.

 

3 Vendors on the Relationship Between Cloud Computing and Virtualization

In this article for Read Write Web, Alex Williams (@alexwilliams) examines videos from Cisco, Citrix and BlueLock in which company representatives address the issue of how virtualization relates to cloud computing.

There has been a fair amount of chatter online recently as to whether or not virtualization and cloud computing are the same thing, and for his article Williams went direct to vendors to get their take — and graded each on their explanation.

BlueLock was the “winner” of the virtualization-cloud video contest, largely due to the company’s clever use of Legos to help viewers visualize how virtualization is changing data center design, which in turn provides a better infrastructure to support cloud-based services. However, each company provides a fair assessment of these technologies and how they can better support today’s rapidly changing IT environment.

At the end of the day, I suppose this is all an argument of semantics, but one thing is for sure: virtualization and the cloud will be top-of-mind for IT professionals for the foreseeable future. If you don’t have a good understanding of how these technologies can work for your business, check out the full article.

 

The Six Levels of Primary Data Storage

By Matt Prigge, this InfoWorld article takes a look at several basic options for data storage, and what type of organization may be a good fit for each. Says Prigge, “the primary storage ladder can be broken down into six distinctive rungs. Who you are and what you do will determine your best option.”

He goes on to explore the options in ascending order of complexity, along with recommended number of users, approximate cost, redundancy level and hardware/software examples for each:

• Peer to peer
• File server
• Low-end SAN
• Enterprise-class SAN
• Network-based storage virtualization
• Cloud

Read the full article for details on the above storage structures, or to determine what options might be appropriate for your organization.

 

Top 5 Network Management Investments

Spurred by virtualization, tight budgets and smaller staffs, the need for improving efficiencies within IT environments continues to grow. For Network World, Ann Bednarz offers five suggestions for network managers looking to do more with less:

• Consolidate management tools across the enterprise, which in addition to cost savings can also help you get a clearer understanding of your complete infrastructure, rather than individual silos.
• Invest in network configuration and change management (NCCM) tools, which can help to provide network disruption notifications more quickly through automation, as opposed to manual monitoring.
• Increase application awareness, including: what applications are active, what users are accessing them and the end-user experience with each.
• Pay for analysis, not monitoring, when considering new software-management tools.
• Exploit untapped capabilities in existing toolsets, by making sure that you fully understand what all of your existing tools can do for you.

For details on each of these suggestions, see Bednarz’ complete article.

 

Internet Phone Providers Shake up Telecommunications

TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington (@arrington) reported that Cisco may be looking to purchase Skype before the Internet-phone company completes its IPO process. Nothing has been confirmed at time of publication, and even the Wall Street Journal’s Deal Journal is having trouble understanding exactly what value Skype can bring to Cisco. That being said, this is in the wake of Google announcing its free Internet-to-phone calling service, Voice Calls from Gmail, as reported by the New York Times’ David Pogue.

So, what does all this mean to you? As Internet services continue to offer free or low-cost calling options, and as the call quality increases, you may see drastic changes to your telecommunications environment. If unsanctioned, employees using these services at work may affect wireless network quality for others. Or, if your company is considering further adoption of these technologies, it’s time to start thinking about what that means to your voice, video and data network.

 

What Do You Think?

What articles, blog posts, videos or podcasts did you find interesting last month? This post is an MCPc blogging team collaboration. Post a comment and we’ll be sure to keep an eye on those sources for future wrap-up articles like this one.

 

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