Just this past month, Canon has announced a replacement to its 1D line of professional DSLR camera. The EOS-1D X. It’s boasting an 18 Megapixel sensor, capable of 12-14 Frames per second, as well as full motion video. Price has not been announced yet, but it’s not for the faint of heart.

Still photography technology is a big subscriber in the trickle-down theory. As it evolves, the older professional technology is moved down into consumer level product, and we will continue to see improvement across the entire board. Based on previous Canon lines, it’ll be approximately 5 years before these specifications are going to be pretty close to what’s on the shelves down at Best Buy, so for those of you that are photography buffs, we will keep seeing more and more features down the road arriving in Canon and competitor SLR cameras.

By Matt Giancola, Field Service Consultant for Data Network Group.

For the better part of twenty years Microsoft has been the undisputed world-wide leader in all things software. But recently it seems some things have changed up there in Redmond, WA. Is it me or does every new desktop product that Microsoft comes out with nowadays seem to mimic the current competition? (I’m going to exempt Microsoft’s current Server products from this post as they remain the industry standard and are fine, fine products in my opinion.) Case in point: Internet Explorer 9. I installed IE9 last night on my new laptop and when arriving at the office this morning launched it for the first time. I could have sworn I was looking at the latest release of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox. The layout, menu options and basic graphics are eerily similar to these other products.

This all started with Windows 7. This has been blogged countless times over the past few years but it seems Microsoft made no attempt to hide the fact that they were blatantly ripping off a lot of the visual and user experience aspects of the hugely popular Mac OSX operating system. And so far it has worked. As many of you would who are now using Win 7 can probably concur (excepting you XP diehards of course) the current OS is a thing of beauty.

It is going to be very interesting going forward to see how Microsoft reacts to this newfound competition and pressure that for years they didn’t really have to worry about. I was at a Hyper-V virtualization training session recently at Microsoft’s Denver facility and was strange hearing them describing themselves as the underdogs to VMWare in the virtualization market even considering they were latecomers to that technology. Will Microsoft continue to be the innovative trendsetters that made them the biggest corporate juggernaut this world has ever seen or will they come back to the pack and let these younger, hungrier competitors take more of the pie? This will be fascinating to watch over the next decade.

To understand how far we have come in the cellular network realm, we need to take a look back at when it all started in the 1980’s. This is when 1G was implemented and it did not support encryption, only reached speeds of 10 kbps, and could only make calls from a few select areas.

Today’s 3G versus 4G decision has many people upgrading their devices simply based on the belief that they will receive faster connection speeds to utilize while surfing the web or connecting via their new app. This is true, so long as you live in an area that provides a 4G network.

The “G” in 4G refers to generation and we have now entered the 4th generation in our cellular network advancements. The capabilities of a 4th generation network are greatly improved to that of 3G, but the average consumer probably won’t see the benefit of this right away. As 4G devices are being rolled out by service providers to the consumer, they are also in the process of upgrading their networks piece by piece.

This means that depending on where you are in the country, you may not have access to a 4G network on a daily basis, even though your phone is designed to use it. 4G is being deployed in highly populated and metropolitan areas first. The good news is that 4G phones are able to operate on any of the lower generation networks if that is all that is available. This is why a few other questions may seem a little more relevant when buying a new phone.

• How many towers does your service provider have in the area and what is your proximity to them in the places you are the most, such as at home or at work?
• How technically advanced is the hardware in the phone that you are looking at purchasing? Believe it or not, some of the 3G phones may outperform some of the newer 4G models simply based on hardware specifications and the coverage type in many areas.
• How many people are using the same towers that you are using?

The bottom line is that the generation of cellular network you are using is only part of what determines how fast the data appears in your hands. It is hard to determine the answer to question 3 but the answer can be loosely based on the population of the area you are in. 4G will certainly become the mainstream network type for most carriers in the United States but it may take up to a year or so for that transition to take place. Until then, several phone models will be released and revised as will the technology that provides the connections for them.

by Dillon Johnson, Remote Support Specialist for Data Network Group.

Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation is a low cost alternative to Small Business Server and was created to provide an affordable entry level platform for small businesses. Foundation server is an ideal first server and can be deployed easily to create a single –server network, that’s reliable and secure. Let’s take a quick look at what’s included with this version of the Windows Server Family, what limitations Microsoft has put on it and what is the upgrade path.

Windows server Foundation is targeted at the smallest of server environments with basic IT needs. File and print sharing, network security and remote access are the core functions that this server brings to companies at this level. The Foundation server also gives small companies the ability to centrally manage settings on all your Windows based computers connected to the network. Foundation is capable of running most line of business server applications approved for Windows 2008. Also, Windows Server Foundation can be used for Internet Web services and as a Web server platform for intranets and extranets where user authentication is required.

Microsoft has designed this server with some limitations, the number of users allowed, processors and memory, are all factors for small companies to consider before choosing this server version. Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation is licensed by user accounts. You may create up to 15 user accounts that can access and use the server software. Each User Account must be assigned to one user, and each User Account permits one user, using any device, to access and use the server software on the licensed server. Because Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation is licensed in this way, you do not require Windows Server client access licenses (CALs). This also makes Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation much more cost effective for small businesses. This Server Software is only available through original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and only on single processor servers. You cannot obtain installation media for Windows Server 2008 Foundation at retail locations. In addition, Windows Server 2008 Foundation only supports X64 bit OS and provides access to a maximum of 8 GB of available memory. There is no virtualization support on this server. Foundation has built-in protections to keep it from doing more than what it is intended to do; specifically, the Foundation server is not intended to be part of a domain trust and will eventually shut down if it is in a trust for more than 10 days.

As your business grows, Foundation server provides an easy upgrade path to higher end versions of Windows Server and can be upgraded in place to Windows Server Standard. However, because of the hardware restrictions of foundation, the original hardware may not be a good choice for running the more advanced versions of Windows Server 2008.

by Steve Maurer, Account Manager for Data Network Group.

About every two years, once my contract is up, I run out and get a new cell phone with all the latest and greatest features. The dilemma: What to do with that old phone? Back in the old days our office had a small cardboard box full of old cell phones, batteries, chargers and accessories. It was tucked high upon a shelf in a storage room and remained there until we finally brought it to recycling. Now it’s really easy to recycle your old cell phone and its accessories.

There are many options to dispose of your old cell phone. If it’s in good working condition it can be used by charitable organizations or it can be sold at a low cost to those in need. It can be recycled by the manufacturer or by a local recycling center such as Ecocyle here in Boulder.

Recycling cell phones helps the environment by saving energy and keeping usable materials out of landfills. Cell phones are made of precious metals and plastics-all of which require energy to mine and manufacture. Recycling conserves these materials so they can be turned into new products.

The first thing to do is ask your retailer if they’ll take your old phone. Some retailers will take them at their location and others want you to mail them in. Before you hand over your phone, make sure your service contract is up and that your phone’s data and SIM card have been removed so that your valuable information is no longer accessible. You can contact your service provider or phone manufacturer for instructions on how to do this. You can also use a data erasing tool such as ReCellular’s Cell Phone Data Eraser to remove the data.

The following retailers and cell phone manufacturers allow you to drop off your old cell phone, PDA, cell phone batteries, chargers, or other accessories at their locations. Call or stop in to find out more information about their drop-off and collection information.

• AT&T
• Best Buy
• LG Electronics
• Office Depot
• Sony Ericsson
• Sprint
• Staples
• T-Mobile
• Verizon

by Lynn Mareth, Vice President at Data Network Group.

Thankfully, the days of PST files are over. You know, those pesky little Archive folders scattered in hidden locations on your laptop, desktop and terminal server profile?

Microsoft Exchange 2010 includes a new (and great) feature, called online archive, which enables you to provision your mailbox-enabled users with a familiar personal archive, available online, providing you with a lot of features to preserve and discover e-mail data.

Personal Archive is a specialized mailbox associated with a user’s primary mailbox. It appears alongside the primary mailbox folders in Outlook or Outlook Web App, giving users direct access to archived email in the same way as non-archived email. For example, users can search both their Personal Archive and primary mailbox using Outlook or Outlook Web App. Email items from the primary mailbox can be automatically offloaded to the Personal Archive through retention polices, and administrators can also import historical email data from .PST files directly into Exchange. With the flexibility to provision a user’s Personal Archive to a different mailbox database from their primary mailbox; organizations can more easily implement separate storage strategies for less frequently accessed email.

Retention polices can be used to apply settings to specific items, conversations or folders in a mailbox. Policies are configured by the Exchange administrator and are displayed in Outlook 2010 inside each email along with a header stating the applied policy and delete date. There are two types of policies available to users: delete policies and archive policies. Both types of policies can be combined on the same item or folder. For example, an email can be tagged so that it is automatically moved to the Personal Archive in 15 days and deleted within 45 days. Administrators can also use archive policies to control when messages are automatically moved from a primary mailbox to the Personal Archive.

In addition, Legal Hold enables the preservation of a user’s edited and deleted mailbox items (email, appointments, tasks, etc.) from both their primary mailbox and Personal Archive. Legal Hold can be set on individual mailboxes or across the enterprise. They can also be set for a specific time period (for example, place a mailbox on hold for 90 days). In addition, Legal Hold includes an option that automatically alerts users through Outlook 2010 that a hold has been placed on their mailbox.

Want more information? Give us a call and we can discuss how to move your organization to Exchange 2010.

by Michael Perkins, President at Data Network Group.

Rob joined the DNG team in December of 2010 and is a member of our internal helpdesk team. You may have spoken to Rob on the phone when you have called in for support. He has worked his way up in the IT field, first with taking on additional responsibilities in the Architectural and Drafting fields, and then moved into the Customer Service industry. After a brief journey in the software testing field, he dove head first into the IT industry over three years ago, and has found a home. In his spare time, he enjoys cooking, spending time outdoors, and has begun a landscape photography business.