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What The Sunset Of Windows 7 Means To Its Users

Windows 7 is being “put out to pasture” by Microsoft at the beginning of 2020.  Not all Windows 7 users are aware of precisely what this means and how it can affect their day-to-day business.  Because of impending issues, such as steadily degrading usability and increasing security vulnerabilities, Windows 7 users need to know what to expect and what their options are.

Quick Background On Windows 7

Windows 7 was released in October of 2009.  Its purpose was to serve as an incremental upgrade to the not-so-well-received Windows Vista operating system. Windows 7 included some much-needed improvements to Windows Aero, the new user interface that Microsoft introduced with Vista, and with improved performance.  Users responded far more positively to Windows 7 than they did Vista, primarily because it addressed so many of Vista’s deficiencies.  The Windows 7 Service Pack 1 came out in 2011, and a platform update was released a few years later in 2013.

By 2014, however, Microsoft began preparations for the retirement of Windows 7 as they began stopping its retail sales.  Next, mainstream support for the operating system came to a halt.  In 2016, PCs were no longer shipped with Windows 7 pre-installed.  Microsoft then announced that on January 14, 2020, extended support for Windows 7 would end.  That was the official sunset announcement.

What Sunset Means

Sunset begins with Microsoft no longer offering extended support for Windows 7.  It also means no more security updates, bug fixes, or service packs.  That, in turn, means the usability, security, and performance of Windows 7 will begin to degrade with time.  On the surface, applications and the operating system will generally perform all right, but there will always be exceptions.  Over time, however, there will be a definite trend toward more issues, steadily poorer performance, and serious security vulnerabilities.

Why This Important to Windows 7 Users
Here is what a Windows 7 user can expect to see after sunset begins:

  • Software, utilities, and features may become incompatible
  • Applications no longer receive updates that apply to Windows 7
  • New devices (g., printers or webcams) may not be able to connect with Windows 7
  • Antivirus will not be updated, and third-party virus protection software will eventually stop supporting Windows 7
  • Software bug fixes are no longer patched, leaving the system open to exploitation
  • Online banking transaction systems may expire if their authentication and encryption methods cannot be supported by Windows 7

Also, incompatibility can quickly become a problem for companies whose customers or partners need them to use or interface with software that simply will not run correctly on Windows 7.  Running a sunset operating system can also cause problems when attempts are made to add devices or install new software.

The most serious issues with sunsetting are those involving security.  Hackers will know that Windows 7 has become vulnerable and will seek out ways to exploit those weaknesses.  This leaves a system susceptible to malware, ransomware, and viruses.  The probability of suffering from an attack that renders your computers unusable will continue to increase with time.

Windows 7 Sunset

Options Available to Windows 7 Users

If you are running Windows 7, then now is the time to start migrating to a new operating system.  The most straightforward upgrade path would be Windows 10, which still has some of the look and feel of Windows 7 with a plethora of new features and even better usability.

The other option for most businesses is switching to Mac OS.  This means an entirely new work environment for traditional Microsoft users. This option can involve a steep learning curve.  While some Microsoft packages, such as Office, are available for Mac OS, they work a bit differently and it will take some time for new users to become proficient. Macs can also be more expensive than a Windows-based computer system, but have a reputation for being more reliable.

Unless a business is heavily involved in video production or graphic design, Windows 10 is probably the best option.

Getting Ready to Migrate

Before migrating, perform an inventory of software and group each application into one of three groups: unwanted, optional, or required.  Some software may require an upgrade to run on a newer operating system.  Next, prepare a similar inventory of hardware.  As with the software, some hardware may need to be updated or replaced to remain compatible with the new operating system. Also, check the requirements of the replacement operating system, paying special attention to available hard drive space, physical memory, and processor or CPU needs.

Please note that if a machine is already getting a bit outdated (e.g., 7 or more years old), it might make sense to purchase a new machine with Windows 10 pre-installed. The Trump tariffs will cause an increase in the price of computers, scanners, printers, servers and even their components. So now is definitely the best time to buy!

Conclusion

With the sunset of Windows 7 impending, now is the time to start the process of migrating to a new operating system, whether it be Windows 10 or Mac OS.  Failure to upgrade will not only lead to issues with compatibility and performance, but will involve serious security risks.

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What Is The Best Mobile Scanning App?

With the business world rapidly moving towards the digitization of documents, mobile scanning apps are becoming necessary for both work and personal use. However, in our day-to-day interactions, we encounter entities, such as the government or doctor’s office that require old-fashioned forms that are printed on paper.

Mobile Scanning App

Sometimes we are handed a business card from someone with important contact information we need to retain. Because not everything has moved to digital media, the most useful resolution is to quickly transform any paper you’re handed into digital data, which you can store and edit on your computers and mobile devices. Once stored, you have them practically forever if need be.

Think about the amount of physical information you encounter daily that you need to retain for your professional and personal life: spreadsheets, software information, receipts, financial records, old photographs your parents have, etc. If you need to capture that data or images for future use, having a scanner at your beck and call is an efficient way to operate.

The availability of a mobile scanning app that runs off your smartphone and uses your phone cam to snap the image can allow you to capture more information. This gives you the freedom to correctly analyze and pull out the important stuff for later.

Let’s look at some of the best mobile apps out there. Some of these scanning apps are free, while others are highly affordable. Try to match up your needs to the right app.

What Are The Best Free Mobile Scanning Apps?

Microsoft Office Lens for Android

Microsoft recently launched Office Lens for Android, a scanning app that lets you shoot photos of written materials like notepads, printed documents, and whiteboards, converting printed words in the image to editable text through OCR. Microsoft has other mobile scanning apps such as Evernote, but they’ve added some remarkable functions to this new app. The Office Lens gives you the ability to scan documents, cards, and whiteboards with your Android phone, making them more readable and editable. Best of all, it’s a free app!

Evernote Scannable for iPhone

If you are already an Evernote user, this app scans anything you put in front of it and sends it to your Evernote account, or another place that you designate. It has the capability to share the files with other people very easily, as well. Imagine you’re in a meeting with a number of team members or clients. You can use the app to scan a few files from the meeting, and Scannable will instinctively ask you if you want to share the images with the people in your meeting. If you have already listed the attendees in a meeting invite and you’ve granted Scannable access to your calendar, it will send them the data immediately. How’s that for convenience?

Adobe Scan for iPhone

If you already have a paid Adobe Document Cloud or Creative Cloud account and use it regularly, this app is a no-brainer. Sometimes you have a piece of paper that you need to get into digital form. The Adobe Scan app can not only produce a PDF using your smartphone camera, but it can also employ optical-character recognition (OCR) to the scanned image so that you can freely edit its text. For an app that automatically detects, captures, and converts printed text to digital form, Adobe Scan is a perfect app. But once again, you need a paid subscription to get all its impressive features.

What Are The Best Mobile Scanning Apps Under 5 Dollars?

Abbyy FineScanner

Abbyy has been in the scanning technology business for a very long time, and that gives them a leg up on the new and robust competition. Experts have been impressed with its use on older high-end desktop scanners. Its mobile scanning tool Abbyy FineScanner, is impressive as well. FineScanner does a terrific job of scanning any type of printed document. It’s very fast at snapping the photo image and also gives the user the option of color or black-and-white.

The one downside to the Abbyy FineScanner is its price disclosure. You can download a free version, but the free version doesn’t support the software’s best feature, its optical character recognition (OCR). For this feature, you need to pay either $4.99 a month or $19.99 for the year. If you sign up through the website, a free month of premium subscription is available.

Intsig CamScanner

This mobile scanning application has a unique feature that sets it apart from other apps under $5. The Instig CamScanner will separate the document acquisition process (take a picture of the image and turn it into text) from the document management process. If speed is important to you, this app is very fast at taking the image and converting it for you. Intsig CamScanner’s optical character recognition (OCR) is not as accurate as some of the other apps. If accuracy is crucial for you, Instig CamScanner might not be the right scan app for you to download.

TurboScan

TurboScan, a $4.99 app for Android and iOS, is an unpretentious app that precisely saves documents and images for you to edit elsewhere. It is not the fastest, nor does it have a processing niche like the other featured mobile scanning apps. What it does have is consistency in both its accuracy and quality at an affordable price.

Wrap Up

Technology is moving forward at a lightning fast pace. Be sure to check often for the latest and greatest scanning apps and you might be surprised at what some tech guru has come up with.

 

What Is The Best Mobile Scanning App? Read More »

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Why do executives choose to bring in IT consultants to plan and enact business continuity strategies?

A business continuity plan is one that ensures continuous delivery of products and services to clients, especially after critical operations have ceased, as often happens after a major disaster.

Business Continuity Strategies

How exactly does a business continuity plan work? This system is put in place to ensure that if your operations are disrupted for any reason, there are mechanisms in place to get things back up and running as quickly as possible. Years ago, this was not considered necessary by most business owners. However, with the number of severe disasters America suffers each year, it has become essential.

From one end of the nation to the other, disasters do strike. California now experiences more severe fire seasons than ever, not to mention earthquakes. All coastal areas, especially in the south and along the east coast are prone to floods and hurricanes. The mid-section of America is known as “Tornado Alley.” There’s seemingly nothing we can do to stop Mother Nature, but we can be prepared. As a business owner, this is a must.

The Role Played By IT Organizations In A Business Continuity Plan

Nowadays, most businesses depend wholly on their computer and networking systems for everything from customer service and shipping to billing.

Any type of disruption to your business operations can be costly in more ways than one. Often, the disruption turns out to be an IT issue. Certain industries are even more vulnerable. These include health organizations. They provide critical services to their patients. The whole nature of healthcare is providing excellent patient care. That means on-time, dependable services. In this sector, lives literally are at stake, so a business continuity plan is vital.

A Business Continuity Plan includes setting up, running, and maintaining backup systems for all data and applications.  Most include onsite and offsite data backup and recovery initiatives.

Important Aspects Of An Effective Business Continuity Plan

Any plan must be well-thought-out and well-orchestrated so that it works correctly and quickly to restore access to files and apps. Below is a simple checklist with guidelines about how to create a Roadmap to your own customized Business Continuity Plan.

  • Conduct A Business Impact Analysis

This establishes the core mandate of the business. From this analysis, a business owner can derive the importance of the most critical services offered by that specific organization. The impact analysis should also be aimed at discovering the internal and external impacts that any disruption would cause. Once the critical services and products have been identified, they must be put on a priority list. The priority list should be based on other factors such as additional expenses, loss of revenue, and even intangible losses.

Some of the identified threats in a business include natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, and tornados depending on the geographical area where your business is situated. Other general threats include fires, cyber-attacks, and even terrorist attacks. Each of these may have different impacts and so the recovery plan must be able to address each of these threats separately.

  • Designing The Continuity Plan

In designing your plan, you must also identify the specific person or department that will be responsible for its implementation in that area. In most instances, the IT department will be a big part of this, whether you’re using in-house personnel or IT managed services. Public Relations might also come in handy, especially in the event of a natural disaster. It’s important to keep your customers or patients calm during the crisis. Customers need and want to know what’s going on. Try to be as transparent as possible. This can help you avoid the loss of customer trust and brand reputation.

  • Facility Resources

What resources have been set aside to help in the recovery process? Your budget should include an allocation for unexpected negative events. Whether your office is flooded because of a plumbing leak, or the roof is torn off by high winds, you need monies in your budget allocated for just this type of incident.

For instance, cyber-crimes are becoming almost commonplace. In the case of a cyber-attack, are you prepared? What would you do if today, one of your employees clicked on a bad link and a ransomware virus was downloaded into your computer system? Do you have IT experts on staff who would know what to do? Are you prepared to pay a ransom of thousands of dollars to restore access to your database? Cyber-crimes are occurring with much more frequency. They can bring a business to a standstill in a moment’s time.

Testing Your Business Continuity Plan

This is the phase that comes immediately after implantation of the plan itself. Testing your plan is so important. You may have missed something critical during the planning stages. Now is the time to find out where the gaps are. This is your golden opportunity to fix those gaps and address all those issues. If you wait until a real disaster strikes, it could end up costing a lot more money to deal with the evolving circumstances.

Why Executives Work With IT Consultants

Tragedy strikes when least expected. Those who survive are the ones who adequately prepared for every contingency. Most business owners are simply not experienced enough to do all this legwork and planning on their own. It takes a specialized team of people to design, implement and test a Business Continuity Plan. That’s why so many of today’s savvy business executives hire IT consultants who specialize in this field.

A good IT consultant will come in and asses your current IT infrastructure. They will help you understand what your strengths and weaknesses are. They will put together a plan that fits your budgetary requirements. In the end, you should be able to institute a much stronger business continuity plan for less money when you work with a professional IT consultant. They bring value to the process of planning for the unforeseen.

Why do executives choose to bring in IT consultants to plan and enact business continuity strategies? Read More »

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Tips to Keep IT Managers on Top of Their Work

An IT manager’s work can be difficult at times. This is mostly because of the ever-dynamic nature of technology. There is always something new and better being developed every day. It is the work of the IT manager to know the best technology to use, one that functions on a 24-hour basis and also one that’s easy to manage by the employees. He must ensure that his employer stays current on the specific technology that delivers the desired results.

IT Manager

Change is a good thing, but not when it concerns IT managers. They are usually cautious of introducing changes that might cause chaos. So then how will they be able to overcome their fears and embrace change that will improve their employees’ working environment? Here are some useful steps to help IT managers improve their workplace, maintain modern standards, and give all employees a better work experience.

Introduce a Digital Task Force

This can be done through the labor model which gives employees the flexibility and freedom to work from just about anywhere. This, of course, depends on the specific tasks and what projects employees must get done each day. The only problem is that different employees have different preferences. Some prefer more advanced technologies because that is what they are accustomed to in their personal lives. Others would like to work with old-fashioned systems. This only makes it harder for IT supervisors to find solutions that work for everyone.

Using one software package in the workplace is no longer effective. The IT department should work alongside departmental heads in order to manage ever-changing demands in the digital workplace. They should work through and adopt technology that will boost employee productivity. Technology must be user friendly as well.

Combat Resistance

This is an obvious challenge because it is not easy to introduce something new and then get 100% acceptance. Some employees will still try to resist the changes, not because it isn’t beneficial, but because of the fear that they might not be able to master the new technology. The best way to deal with resistance is to get the employees involved right from the start, way before the organization makes an investment in the new technology.

Communication is also an essential part of the whole process. Discuss the advantages of the new technology and the positive impact it will have on them and how it will improve their work place in terms of productivity. Ask for feedback. Look to department supervisors to provide reports when they encounter any problem.

Security

Keeping a system secure is not an easy task, especially with the increased reports of data breaches. Limiting the access points to sensitive data is one way of ensuring that your system is protected. The employees should be made to understand the need to balance between easy access and the data breach threats. They should also be taken through an awareness training touching on accidental exposure, insider theft, phishing emails, and attacks like ransomware and malware. These coupled with other training will ensure that there is better service delivery and that necessary security measures are in place.

Systematically Deal with the Tech Stack

Tech stack is the overwhelming number of applications or software that are no longer useful but still remain installed in a computer system. There are always new upgrades made, but rarely does anyone follow-up and get rid of the software that is outdated. These software programs could be used as the backdoor entrance for cyber thieves. IT managers should always ensure that these “doors” are closed and locked.

There should be constant communications between the chief technology officers and the department’s chief information officers with a view to streamline the sharing of data and information on cloud-based platforms. The Cloud ensures that users are able to access documents, make edits to them and any changes are automatically updated ensuring accuracy across the board.

Show Your Importance

Today, software updates are easy to do since more technology is moving to cloud. Even with that, the IT manager still needs to ensure that new software is beneficial to the users and that it is a worthwhile investment. A lot of research should be conducted to ensure that the new technology is yielding the desired results.

Wrap Up

When it comes to the introduction of new technology in the workplace, IT managers should treat this like a team effort long before it is introduced. Throughout the necessary training for employees, to the follow-up process once the technology is in place, everyone needs to be included. A savvy IT leader will take strategic moves to make changing over to newer systems a positive process for everyone.

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BreakFix Vs Managed IT Services What You Need To Know When Selecting IT Services

Is Your Break/Fix IT Company Costing You Too Much? You Need Affordable Managed IT Services in Omaha, Nebraska

Managed IT Services are the most cost-effective way to keep your computers and network up to speed. It’s a predictable way to ensure your technology will run at peak performance. For a monthly, fixed, and easy-to-budget-for fee, you’ll have today’s latest IT technology.

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Without Managed IT Services, your system is vulnerable to crashes, viruses, and downtime. You can’t be sure that it’s properly maintained. Regular monitoring and patching is essential these days.

Downtime due to IT issues? This can really slow the work flow, plus everyone’s attention is focused on the network problems instead of their jobs.  It’s hard to even figure the cost of downtime due to network failures. For instance, a system failure at Virgin Blue in 2010 went on for 11 days, finally affecting over 50,000 passengers. Yes, Virgin Blue suffered financially, but the real damage was to their brand name.

IT Security

With all the malicious IT threats circulating today, avoiding them can be challenging. All types of viruses, malware, and ransomware are being released today to unsuspecting users. These viruses can work their way through all your connected devices, shutting them down. In a ransomware attack, cyber thieves hold your data hostage until you pay the ransom. Sometimes, even after paying, you still don’t get full access to your records.

If your data is breached, and you operate under stringent regulatory guidelines, you can expect to pay hefty fines and possibly face litigation from your customers!

All it takes is one link in a phishing email that an employee clicks on. When this happens, who are you going to call? The break-fix company might get there today, but it often requires them several days to respond to a call.

You’re left without your data, and your business operations cease. You can’t bill your customers. You can’t provide services for them. Customers may get upset and take their business to your competition. Your profit margins can suffer significantly.

With Managed IT Services from InfiNet Solutions, this whole scenario can be prevented. For a reasonable monthly fee, we’ll monitor your network and block cyber-attacks before they occur. We also train your employees to recognize phishing emails. We’ll teach your staff what they need to know in order to avoid cyber-breaches.

Remote Monitoring and Management

One of the best things about IT Managed Services is that problems can be detected and repaired before they can negatively affect your business – and in most cases, before you even know there was a problem.

With proactive remote network monitoring, patch management, upgrades, and computer optimization, your technology will run as it should. You can come to the office in the morning without worrying that your server went down during the night.

Managed Services provide remote monitoring of your system 24/7, so you’ll reap the benefits of optimal-functioning technology. And, you won’t have to worry about hackers and viruses. Remote monitoring management (RMM) detects these too and stops them in their tracks.

Backup and Disaster Recovery

Included in that affordable monthly fee, you’ll have a reliable backup and disaster recovery plan in place. Onsite backups aren’t enough. Your data will be stored in a secure cloud solution that you can access whenever and from wherever you need to.

In this day and time, business owners are realizing that they’re just as vulnerable as anyone else when it comes to natural disasters, fires, power outages, and that sort of thing. We’ll ensure that your data stays high and dry in a secure data center. As long as you have a mobile computer or device, it will be there for you and your designated users.

24/7 Help Desk Support

If you require support, service, or just have a question about the software you’re using, you won’t be alone. A trained technician will answer your call.  If they can’t help you, they’ll find someone who can. That’s part of our Managed IT Service. The peace of mind you’ll have is priceless.

Mobile Device Management

Many businesses in Omaha allow their employees to use their own devices at work. But, are they using them securely?  How do you know they are? An MDM solution ensures they will.

And if a device is lost or stolen, we can remotely clear your business data from the device. If a disgruntled employee leaves with your confidential information, wouldn’t you want to do this?

There’s so much more we can share. The best thing for you to do is to schedule a no-obligation consultation with us. We can come to your office at your convenience, and answer all of your questions. Once we do, you’ll be convinced that InfiNet can save you money in too many ways to mention with our Managed IT Services.

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