Boffins Quarterly Digest - Autumn 2009

Newsletter August 2009

Newsletter

Dear Customer,

Swine flu delivers a wake-up call

None of us is quite sure whether swine flu could turn out to be as big as predicted. But the very fact that it may affect many of us, is enough for businesses small and large to consider the effect that a major disruption such as staff being laid up at home could have on business continuity. Already, many local businesses have approached Boffins seeking advice on how IT can be used to ensure the uninterrupted operation of their business.

In truth, the potential pandemic throws up some similar issues that could affect any business, if its premises were disrupted by fire, flood or any manner of other third party interventions. So, the question is, how prepared are you for the disruption that swine flu could cause?

At the very least, every business should have thought about the issues, and have a business continuity plan. By thinking about it now, and taking some simple actions, you will be much better placed to cope efficiently with any eventuality. The plan needs to start with the basics, even who keeps a spare set of door keys, and how data back-ups are accessed.

Today, establishing mobile working for staff is easier and cheaper than ever. It does take a little time, however, and so planning ahead is well worth while. The essential infrastructure that allows staff to work from home includes ensuring they have adequate IT hardware, setting up secure access via the internet to data held on company servers, and ensuring that they have a good broadband connection.

You’ll need to arrange for email systems to work seamlessly, wherever they are accessed, and that any other software remote staff will need is loaded on terminals and properly licenced. In addition, phone systems need to be configured so that call traffic can be efficiently forwarded.

Thankfully, the recently launched Boffins Building Blocks programme can easily assess your current level of preparedness, and provide a shopping list of items that need attending to, in order to ensure you are ready to survive not only a swine flu epidemic, but pretty much any other business disruption you can think of.
And, as a result – swine flu or no – you may well discover that you have laid the foundations for a more effective and efficient way of working in the future.

Jim White
Boffins Computer Workshops

Internet Explorer 8 – look before you leap

The launch of Internet Explorer 8 promises faster browsing and greater online security. But before you launch into an upgrade, especially on a server, give Boffins a call first.

Right now, the upgrade may not be all good news, depending on the way you use the internet. There are a number of compatibility issues with websites, when you visit them using IE8. And, although there is an IE7 compatibility mode, this latest version may throw up other issues that could potentially cause problems with other software.

At Boffins, we’re already testing the new release extensively, and building a database of issues and workarounds - so give our technical team a call, and take our advice to avoid any problems when you upgrade.

Building Blocks to a 21st Century Business – Block 2

If establishing a first class link into the Internet is the first block in building your 21st Century Business then protecting your network with a suitable firewall is the second.

Read the latest datasheet in our Building Blocks to a 21st Century Business series at:
http://news.boffins.co.uk/product-information/building-block-2/

Your feedback is important!

Please spare 5 minutes because we’d love to hear what you think about our monthly newsletters. Just visit the link below, answer the 6 short questions, and we may be able to offer you some complimentary consultancy.

Thank You!

http://fs19.formsite.com/boffins/form072213545/index.html

Another happy customer

“Having used Boffins for all this time, I would, of course, recommend them to any company. The peace of mind that we get from knowing they are taking care of our IT needs is invaluable.”

Stephen Penn
Managing Director
Alpeco

Read the full case study at:
http://news.boffins.co.uk/case-studies/alpeco/

Newsletter July 2009

Newsletter

Dear Customer,

At the turn of the year we started a partnership with EntaNet to provide 21st Century Network Broadband connections and other internet services under the Boffins brand. We already have some customers up and running and have successfully migrated our own connections. And now that we are sure about the quality of the products and support, have trained our engineers, and have developed significant experience, we are delighted to offer the products more widely.

In this newsletter we are launching the first of our Building Blocks to your 21st Century Business. High quality broadband provision is the cornerstone that will enable you to enjoy the benefits discussed last month. Boffins C21 Plus Broadband is true business quality and will deliver up to 24Mbit download speeds on enabled exchanges with up to 1Mbit upstream. All this comes with static IPs included at a highly competitive business tariff.

We have appointed John Gardner as product manager for Boffins’ broadband products so that you can be sure of a worry free experience. Ask us for a fixed price quote for new installations and migrations.

Jim White
Boffins Computer Workshops

Boffins Launches Business Internet Services

Boffins Broadband is one of our recently launched Building Blocks, an initiative to help small and medium sized companies make the most of the latest developments in phone, broadband and IT as local telephone exchanges are upgraded.

Boffins Broadband, delivered in association with award-winning broadband specialist Entanet, provides a connection speed of up to 24Mbps and exploits the latest improvements in local exchanges, and phone network upgrades being undertaken as part of BT’s 21CN programme.

Boffins C21 Plus 45 package offers:

• up to 24Mbps download speed, delivered through upgraded local exchanges
• up to 1Mbps upstream
• up to 45Gbytes of peak time download allowance

For companies with a larger requirement or to suit more users, Boffins Broadband offers packages with greater download allowances:

• Boffins C21 Plus 90
• Boffins C21 Plus 135
• Boffins C21 Plus 180

Building Blocks to a 21st Century Business
Boffins Broadband is one of our building blocks to a 21st Century Business. By using the Building Blocks approach, we can help customers improve their businesses incrementally, at a pace and a cost that is best suited to their needs, covering everything from remote working to smart
phone systems.

…a snappy follow up

In Our May issue we featured the ScanSnap scanner from Fujistu. Barely the size of a laptop computer, it converts a scan into a PDF or JPEG file at the touch of a button, and can handle colour and two sided documents.

Here at Boffins we always practice what we preach, and have put the ScanSnap to a tough task. Over the last few weeks we’ve scanned over 10,000 of our archived documents. The result - the contents of several filing cabinets now resides on a
few CD’s!

We’ve also loaded the information onto our Intranet, this mean that all our staff have fingertip access, and because the ScanSnap indexes the documents as it scans, search and retrieval is a breeze.

Just load the ScanSnap with your documents, press go, and walk away while it gets to work!

Get ready for a Windows upgrade

This autumn will see the launch of the much anticipated Windows version 7 - and the good news is that it promises to be a substantial improvement on the existing release.As a Microsoft Gold Partner, Boffins has been beta testing the latest release extensively, and can report that it is everything Vista should have been all along. It works well, and is ready for businesses to use and take advantage of. The software has been released for manufacture, and is scheduled to come to market in October.

Microsoft say that Windows 7 will enable you to work faster and more reliably with a variety of features. You’ll be able to share information and solve problems easily, so you dedicate even more time to developing your business.

Windows 7 will offer:

• Better Communications
• Enhanced speed and Performance including 64-bit Support
• Increased productivity
• Greater accessibility
• Improved Safety & Security

So contact Boffins today, to discuss how best to plan for the roll-out of Windows 7 across your organisation.

Newsletter June 2009

Newsletter

Dear Customer,

British Telecom’s 21st Century Network (see opposite) will revolutionise communications in the UK and will enable Boffins and its Customers to revolutionise the way we do our business. Better communication allows greater flexibility in the way we deploy our staff and resources saving costs, saving fuel, and possibly even saving the planet!

This is the main story in our June newsletter. As promised we start to bring together the building blocks to present a road map to the 21st Century business: Broadband, office and mobile telephony, remote access to email with shared calendars, Virtual Private Networks, firewalls and routers supporting quality of service for voice and data, terminal servers for business critical applications, thin clients, Share Point services for disseminating company information, laptops, PDA’s, and mobile printers.

Over the coming weeks we’ll be publishing a new Whitepaper “A Road Map to 21st Century Business” showing you how you can benefit from these business enabling technologies.

Register now for your copy.

Jim White
Boffins Computer Workshops

21st Century Business

Boffins is launching a Building Blocks initiative to help small and medium sized companies make the most of the latest developments in phone, broadband and IT.
A growing number of local telephone exchanges have recently been upgraded, with the result that businesses can now take advantage of improvements in connectivity across the UK, and harness these for more efficient business.

By using a Building Blocks approach, Boffins will help customers improve their businesses incrementally, at a pace and a cost that is best suited to their needs.

The Boffins box of Building Blocks includes:

• better broadband
• secure router access
• secure virtual private networks (VPNs)
• wireless connections on the move
• effective use of PDAs and BlackBerries
• the latest voice communications and smart voice messaging
• access to head office data from anywhere
• easy document sharing

Local exchanges that have already been upgraded as part of of a £10 billion investment by BT include: Aylesbury, Banbury, Bicester, Didcot, Milton Keynes, Oxford, Reading, Slough, Windsor and Maidenhead, and Wycombe.

This means that Boffins is now providing up to 24Mb broadband to businesses in these areas, whilst bringing together both voice and data into a single, high speed, IP based, routed network.

Special offers on Avaya phone system upgrades

In conjunction with world leading Avaya, we are pleased to announce special pricing of up to 40% off selected phone systems. Call us now on 01844 291110 for further information.

New customer referral scheme

Like all businesses we treasure new business that comes to us by word-of-mouth.

As one of our many satisfied customers, we’d welcome any recommendation you give us. We’ll ensure your referral receives our usual first class service, including a free, without obligation, needs analysis. Thank You.

Another Satisfied Customer

“Prevention of problems is very important to us – in the past we didn’t have that. It feels like a partnership rather than a regular client/supplier relationship and that has definitely been a key part of the success. We feel very comforted by the fact that we are in good hands and would absolutely recommend Boffins to any company.”

Dr Dave Casey
Technical Director
Neftex Petroleum Consultants

To Flexibility and Beyond!

More than 18 million of us use a car to commute to work.

Our average journey time is 27 minutes (rising to 43 if you’re a Londoner). Our roads are congested in the rush hour and the daily commute gets christened the daily grind.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. Simply staggering working hours, or working from home just one day a week would make a dramatic difference to our road networks, and could also reduce overcrowding on public transport systems.

Add to this, staff well being and productivity, growing legislation covering flexible working for employees with young families, rising fuel costs, the green agenda and the need to reduce your carbon footprint, and the cost and logistics of finding and maintaining accessible office space. The case for flexibility in working conditions grows stronger by the week.

Up to now, its been the preserve of the large firms to embrace flexible working, mainly due to the cost and complexity of building a fast and reliable infrastructure to support the ongoing business activities.

However, emerging are initiatives such as BT’s 21st Century Network - which brings high speed connectivity, and convergence of voice and data into a single network - and IT service companies specialising in building low cost, sustainable solutions for smaller, local businesses.

Firms adopting this approach to business are already seeing benefits including reduced absenteeism due to illness, greater staff retention, greater productivity, and reduced operating costs.

At Boffins we believe the key to building a successful, flexible, 21st Century Business, is to have a coherent, step-by-step plan from the beginning. This will ensure that the right foundations are in place and will help avoid buying and implementing incompatible solutions
along the way.

To talk to us more about home working solutions, and IT efficiency, please call us on 01844 291110.

21st Century Businesses are dynamic, responsive, and accessible. Their customer care is driven by a desire to serve, not restricted by circumstance or location

21st Century Business owners and executives make quick judgements and decisions, and require on-demand access to their business systems, wherever they are, whatever they’re doing

21st Century Businesses have sales and customer service teams that respond without delay, they have customer data available to them anywhere, anytime

21st Century Businesses are flexible towards staff and customers, they no longer see size as limit to their aspirations.

Newsletter May 2009

Newsletter

Dear Customer,

I am pleased to announce that just one year after becoming a Microsoft Certified Partner, Boffins has been promoted to Gold Partner Status. This reflects our commitment in training our engineers to provide the best possible support to our clients. One of the benefits of this status is increased access to Microsoft’s own engineers, if we need help resolving problems, further enhancing our ability to react quickly and effectively to major issues.

Our relationship with Kaspersky also goes from strength to strength. We have been discussing our implementation processes with them directly and have been able to refine these further so that we can achieve consistently good installations of their products. We are also now offering their hosted spam filtering product to those clients that wish to protect their networks at the edge. Call if this is of interest.

Finally this month we have included a quick brief on the Fujitsu ScanSnap S510. Many of our Customers want to reduce the paper stored in their offices and improve access to archives by scanning their documents. This product offers excellent capability and great value for those that want to investigate or start electronic document archiving.

Next month we will focus on remote working and details of our first major EBS implementation.

Jim White
Boffins Computer Workshops

Gold star for Boffins

Boffins has been awarded the accolade of Gold Partner by global software leaders Microsoft, recognising the company’s commitment to providing the highest levels of IT support. 

It has been less than one year since Boffins decided to take the first steps towards accreditation by Microsoft, and the recognition demonstrates Microsoft’s complete confidence in the excellence and experience of the Boffins team.

“For more than a decade we’ve been benchmarking ourselves by what our customers said about us,” says Tony Dawes, Boffins’ technical director. “Only latterly did we take a strategic decision to seek Microsoft accreditation, as some larger customers started to ask us for it.”

Along the way, the Boffins team have also been accredited as:

• Microsoft Small Business Specialists - ensuring they deliver appropriate software and cost-effective support for smaller enterprises
• Microsoft Advanced Infrastructure Solution Providers - assuring customers the Boffins team can deliver complex software solutions as clients require them
• Microsoft Authorised Education Resellers - confirming the Boffins team understand the special needs of the education sector
• Microsoft Security Solution Providers - demonstrating Boffins’ thorough knowledge of anti-virus, firewall and protection software solutions.

Greater protection online

 For companies concerned about online threats to their business, the Safe@Office network security system may be just the answer.

The Safe@Office equipment, developed by Check Point Software, provides comprehensive protection across a small business network, against spam, viruses and any other intruders, with a firewall based on the same technologies used by Check Point for Fortune100 company servers.

In addition, Safe@Office can be used to help improve
staff productivity. A filter can restrict internet use by blocking inappropriate sites, supporting an acceptable Web use policy. And the equipment also allows remote users to access the company server from anywhere, allowing authorised users access via their laptop, PDA or iPhone.

Cut the paper

The true paperless office still has yet to arrive, but the ScanSnap series from Fujitsu helps move us closer to that day.

The ScanSnap scanner, barely the size of a laptop computer, converts the scan into a PDF or JPEG file at the touch of a button, and can handle colour and two sided documents. The electronic files can then be exported to any computer, without the need to install additional software.

For more information about how A ScanSnap could cut your paperwork and improve efficiency in your office, call Boffins now.

Simple!
First of all, ScanSnap is simple to use!
With ScanSnap’s “one touch” operation,just place what you want to scan in the scanner and press the “SCAN” button.
Whether you’re scanning two sided documents or color documents, ScanSnap’s “one touch” operation handles everything!

Speedy!
ScanSnap is speedy as well!
ScanSnap quickly converts scanned images into PDF and JPEG files that can be used anywhere.
The S510 can speedily digitize A4 color duplex documents
.
Compact!
The S510 is so compact that it can be placed just about anywhere!
The S510 has a smaller footprint than a notebook computer.
ScanSnap scanners are small enough to easily carry anywhere!

Newsletter April 2009

Newsletter

Dear Customer,

At times like these we all need to make the most of our time and resources. Increasingly our clients have asked us to help them achieve efficiencies and productivity increases by enabling better business communications at home and on the road.

Better and cheaper broadband connections enable staff to work effectively from home using remote email with access to key business systems using Microsoft Terminal Services. Our Avaya PBX systems also support remote telephone extensions using IP phones or PC based soft phones putting your remote staff right in your virtual office network.

When you and your staff are out on the road, you can stay fully in touch using one of a wide range of mobile phones. Have email delivered straight to your phone, access company data using Microsoft SharePoint and mobile internet access, even use your mobile as an extension on your AVAYA IP Office phone system.

We have been able to reduce our own telephony costs by cutting back on exchange lines without cutting back access for our Customers. Using IP trunks we direct most of our outgoing calls through our high speed broadband link which also allows us to communicate between offices at zero cost without touching BT at all!

Ask us how you can achieve these same benefits.

Jim White
Boffins Computer Workshops

Boffins help Save Costs With Small Business Server 2008

The latest release of Microsoft Small Business Server 2008 can help your team make the most of flexible working opportunities.

This upgrade of the server software makes it easier for staff to access files and emails while out on the road or working from home via their laptop or mobile phone. It also ensures that the company’s data is stored, shared and backed up efficiently, making it easier to protect valuable information from external threats such as viruses.

Whether you are currently running a series of individual PCs, or already operate a server, the upgrade promises to dramatically improve efficiency, as well as saving on the cost of individual software licences. Contact us for more details.

The perfect antivirus partner

Boffins are now offering the award-winning Kaspersky Lab range of antivirus software, with products specifically designed to protect small and larger businesses against ever-growing online threats that can disable IT systems.

Kaspersky, which began in 1997 in Moscow, is now an internationally recognised antivirus developer, with Microsoft certified status, and protects the communications and IT infrastructure of numerous major corporations, including Airbus and BBC Worldwide.

The company is particularly strong on Open Space security, covering laptops and smart phones against threats, when they are outside company premises.

As a Kaspersky partner, Boffins are equipped to advise you on the best protection for your system, as well as providing the software and full installation support.

Email on the Move

While many people understand what a BlackBerry is, it’s not the only option for mobile computing and email.

Recent developments in Windows software now make it easier than ever to set up a wide range of handsets for mobile email, without going to the expense and complication of additional BlackBerry server software.

Boffins is now assisting a growing number of clients adding smart phones for staff, linked to a corporate network through Windows Business Server and Windows Exchange Servers. The system works with dozens of handset models, which we can supply if required, uses existing security and anti-virus settings, letting staff send and receive email while out on the road.

The Windows Mobile and inclusive Office Mobile experience allows you to view not only mailbox inboxes but almost every part of Exchange mailboxes. It presents a similar ‘Outlook’ style approach to your PC and includes calendar, contacts and tasks and the ability to read and create Word and Excel documents.

This functionality surpasses that of Blackberry, without the need for additional utilities and servers such as the Blackberry enterprise server. With a Microsoft Exchange mail server in your office all this functionality is already available to you out of the box; the only cost is your choice of handset and phone connection tariff.

At the latest count, there were 64 different Windows mobile based phones on the market, so if it choice that you want, why have a solution that limits you?

Newsletter March 2009

Latest News

Dear Customer,

With businesses across all sectors tightening their belts, we at Boffins are doing our bit to help deliver better value for customers.

For the first half of 2009 we have frozen our charges for contract customers. Clients who renew an existing support contract or sign up before June 30th will enjoy 2008 prices. We know that many sectors are facing tougher times, but also that efficient IT systems are at the heart of businesses that survive and thrive in a downturn.

Our special offers covering Avaya phone system upgrades, and the new Microsoft Business Server software, underline our commitment to helping our customers keep at the forefront of efficient business technology, so do contact us to discuss how these initiatives might help you improve your operations, without breaking the bank.

Rest assured, we’ll be doing all we can to help keep our customers operating in a lean, efficient way to ride out this tough year. If you’re facing a business problem that demands a fresh IT solution, give us a call.

Jim White
Boffins Computer Workshops

Boffins Thames Valley launches

Boffins Computer Workshops has opened a new office in Knowl Hill, Berkshire, between Maidenhead and Reading, ideally located to serve customers from West London to Newbury.

“We deliver a highly personal service,” says managing director Jim White, “and that includes regular visits to clients, to ensure we understand their businesses and can provide more fundamental support. With the new Knowl Hill base, we are never far away from our clients in the Thames Valley”.

The move is an expansion that will build on existing operations at the Haddenham head office, from where clients in Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire will continue to receive the Boffins brand of highly personalised business advice on all matters to do with IT and telecommunications.

Remote support will continue to be available from the team, delivered equally efficiently from either Knowl Hill or Haddenham.

The Thames Valley office can be contacted on 01628 825015, and for those nearer to our Haddenham office, the contact number is unchanged at 01844 291110.

Special offers on phone system upgrades

In conjunction with world leading Avaya, we are making extra discounts available for companies looking to upgrade their systems in the first half of 2009, with two special offers.

For companies currently using a Nortel phone system, in particular the Norstar, BCM and Meridian systems, there are discounts available for upgrading to an Avaya IP Office system instead. The upgrade will ensure users have access to the latest phone technology at a keen price, with the new Avaya system making it easier to serve customers better, and promising improved productivity from staff while lowering running costs.

For existing Avaya INDeX system users, there’s the opportunity to migrate to the latest version of IP Office 500, at a discounted price. The upgrade provides the latest enhancements in IP telephone technology, enabling users to enjoy a more contemporary phone solution.

Boffins is an authorised partner of Avaya - please call for further details of these offers.

Improve efficiency with a server upgrade

Now is a great time to consider sharpening up your IT infrastructure - to ensure you are operating at maximum efficiency, and are ready for future growth.

The Boffins team has recently undergone full training and is now qualified to install, configure and manage the latest release of Microsoft’s server solutions - Small Business Server 2008, and for larger companies, Essential Business Server 2008.

And, if your PCs are looking a little creaky, we are also currently offering a range of great deals on new servers and IT hardware manufactured by Hewlett Packard. Please contact us directly for more information on the equipment from HP, a highly regarded manufacturer of PC hardware.

For those new to servers, they act as a central repository for all your organisation’s files, enabling sharing and efficient data storage and better management of email and security. Staff can access information from home or out on the road, data can be more efficiently backed up and stored. And, of course, the Boffins team can have remote access to fix any issues quickly, should they arise.

For those with servers currently, this latest release is a timely upgrade from earlier Business Server applications. Among the significant enhancements is a substantial improvement in email database capacity, acknowledging the essential role of email in most company communication today. And the package includes the latest versions of key software such as Sharepoint and Forefront Security.

As a Microsoft certified partner, you can be assured that Boffins will provide you with a highly professional level of support across the Business Server range. Call us now, to discuss how an upgrade would improve the speed, efficiency, protection and security of your business.