I Heart Tech

What Will a "Network" Cost You?

TECHSHOW is long over and I am embarrassed about how long it's taken me to hop back on and tap out another post. I wish I had more time during the conference to post as there were many great things going on. It was too much fun and there were so many great people involved. I'm really looking forward to next year. I'm honored to have been asked to return to the planning board for 2008 so I hope to see you there. I've posted my pictures from the show over on the right there,  have a look.

I've been super, super busy since January as we've installed 2 small office networks and are getting ready to start a third this coming weekend. The offices range in size from 4 people to 10. Their network hardware requirements were about the same so I thought I would share some information and average costs involved just in case you've been thinking about taking the plunge. In consideration, assume the following:

• All three offices were running a peer-to-peer network. That means all the computers could see and share files with each other and even printers were shared but there was no centralized location for files and data.
• No new PC's or laptops were required, everyone already had a suitable machine
• New cabling was only needed in one office, for the other 2 it already existed; for the firm that did need it, the cost was about $2000 (yikes!)
• Labor costs varied from about 8 hours to 20 hours and you can figure about $125 an hour
• These are minimal requirements for a small office, you might find that your office needs a few more pieces and parts (but I will say in all honesty that this covers a lot and be careful that you don't get sold a bunch of crap your office doesn't need)

Here's what we did...we installed a centralized server (all were HP Proliants and the average cost which included 3 hard drives and memory was $2900) with Microsoft Small Business Server 2003 (average cost $612). The average cost for a 19" monitor was $200. The switch that connected all the PC's to the server averaged $330, a network attached storage device averaged $690 and a back-up power supply about $475. For security we installed a firewall that averaged $530 and virus protection for the server and 5 users was about $250. So the overall average cost for all the pieces and parts was about $6000 (don't forget to factor in labor). What do you think? I don't think that's too bad, considering what you get.

So just what did they get? Well, here's a little list of the most important things I think they got:

• Centralized, secure and backed-up location for all firm files and data
• Microsoft Exchange which allows the sharing of calendars, contacts and email inboxes
• The ability to log on to their computer at the office from any remote location with Microsoft's Remote Web Workplace
• Outlook Web Access to check their Outlook from any computer
• Real time synchronization for their smartphones with Exchange
• An internal SharePoint site (an intranet)

Those are just a few benefits to installing a "real" network. I should mention that our next step with all three offices is to identify a really good and easy way to manage off-site or online backup.

A few things to keep in mind: The costs I've given you above were 1) averages and 2) prices that I found from shopping around (A LOT). When you talk to vendors and consultants be sure to get more than one quote for hardware costs. I shopped around  for my clients because I'm not in the business of selling hardware, many (maybe even most) consultants can and do sell hardware along with their services.

It's really not that easy to say with certainty that this is EXACTLY what it will cost you, it could be quite a bit more and even less all dependent on your existing infrastructure and your needs but I hope it gives you an idea.

Help and Hope Comes in Small Packages

In my last post I started telling you about a small firm in Nebraska that I am helping - well I hope I am helping. Wow - that's probably not what you want to hear from a consultant - it's like hearing your tattoo artist say "oops".  Even though I've been doing this a long time, I still get nervous about saying "use this", "do that" or "buy this". I don't care how long a consultant has been at it - even the best can be wrong at times. I feel like I can say that with confidence because before I went out on my own, I worked at large firms where we hired "the best" and paid for "the best" and still had to clean up mess after mess. So yes, sometimes I get a little nervous - and it's not like I have an easy audience! (But I should say so-far-so-good, no major blow-ups yet.) So as I started communicating with the folks at B&B, I tried giving them as much info as I could about the suggestions I was making and I'm sure they appreciated it - but in the end they just kept saying "whatever you tell us to get or do, Adriana". Which, honestly, was very refreshing and certainly made me work harder about the new technologies and processes we decided to implement.

From the start of our relationship - it was understood that I would travel to Nebraska and work with them in the office. They don't have an in-house tech person that I could liaison with - why would they? They are an office of three. But I will say that between the three of them and especially with the help of their very capable assistant, we could have done it all over the phone - but really, that's not optimal. So anyway, I gave them a list of things to order and purchase and have ready for my two and a half day visit.

Let's start with laptops. eek. This is like telling someone what car to buy. I will say that I personally LOVE and think the best business laptops are those by IBM (now Lenovo). I have/had a Dell, an Acer and a 4-year old IBM that is THE BEST and I have been at firms with Toshiba's and Compaq's - seen them all. There are many, many great laptops out there. I gave B&B a list of choices based on my likes, experiences and those of my clients, friends and colleagues. Here they are (and mind you, this list is 3 months old so there may be new models):

1. Lenovo 3000  $829.97
2. Lenovo ThinkPad T60 $1,364.00
3. Toshiba Portege R205-S2062 $999.97
4. Toshiba Satellite M105  $899.99
5. Sony VAIO VGN-SZ220 $1,675.00
6. Compaq TC1000T Tablet PC $1,499.99

I was happy to hear that they ordered 2 ThinkPad T60's. They will not hate their laptops.

On to file/document storage (the digital kind). They were storing all of their documents on Mary's PC - she's the legal assistant. And since they were networked together they could all save to, open from or email files from her PC (and yes, they were backing up her PC - good job!). The downside to this system is that her PC has to be powered on to get to it. So if Peter came in over the weekend, he would have to be sure to turn on his PC and hers to get access. At this point in the problem-solving process, the term "server" always - and should - come up. Essentially, Mary's PC was acting as the server but not in the full sense. A true server - one that manages the comings and goings of both users and data on a network can be pricey and with the addition of a server can come a lot of work. So instead we decided to start with a "NAS" - a networked storage device. These are the two I suggested - and actually asked them to order both in case one was DOA when I got there. They could return the one we didn't use.

1. Maxtor 300GB Shared Storage External Hard Drive $192.45
2. SimpleTech 250GB SIMPLESHARE OFFICE SERVER $211.95

More next time...

It's too late to say Happy New Year

I was surprised to hear my dinner date say "happy new year" to our server last night.  Seems to me that the acceptable use policy on that phrase expired around the 7th. Then I thought, well,  better take advantage of it while people still know what you're talking about. So I'll say it and trust your new year is off to a good start! It's been a while since I posted so I have lots to talk about and hope (read: resolved) to post more often. Where to start? With last year, of course.

Last fall I received an email titled "WE NEED HELP." I almost didn't open it - it smelled of spam - like one of those stupid emails I've seen from a widow in  Cameroon seeking a dumb ass to pose as next of kin so she can collect some "inheritance" somewhere. But since I really don't get a lot of spam and it did pass thru two spam filters, I figured it better take a look. And I'm glad I did as from it came some of the coolest clients I've ever had - a small firm in Nebraska who wanted to start using technology better. They are two partners and a legal assistant with a very busy general practice who are looking to increase their mobility, collaborate better and shuffle less paper.  Much of their motivation came from what they learned at TECHSHOW. Having attended two years in a row, they got home all pumped up to "get tech" but just never knew where or how to start. (That's where they found me, btw.)

So we starting talking - over the phone and over email. I asked them lots of questions about what they have in place and what they wanted to do. Having spent nearly 10 years in law offices of all shapes and sizes - I was scared. I had visions of floppy disks, Windows98 and stacks of paper so yellow that you'd swear a dog had lifted his leg to them. But I was pleasantly surprised to learn that they had fairly new computers, were networked with a printer and running Office 2002. They were even using TABS for billing. Didn't sound like too bad a place to start.

It's not unusual for an attorney (or any person,  for that matter) to be unaware of what version of this application or that utility they are running. And short of sitting physically at the PC, it's impossible for me to get that information over the phone. But of course, there's help. Check out a great little program called Belarc Advisor that runs an audit on your PC and spits out a report of everything you have installed.

So that's where we started and that's all I have time to write about now. Am I leaving you on the edge of your seat or what? To be continued...