Can you believe Windows XP is over 12 years old?  Released in 2001 and used by millions it is arguably Microsoft’s most successful operating systems to date, it will certainly be the end of an era when support is finally ended for it on 8th April 2014.  From an IT Support perspective there will of course be concerns when this day finally comes.  Apart from no product support and inevitable future product incompatibilities, the biggest risk from continuing to use XP after support ends is due to windows security updates ceasing to be released.  Without regular security patching, Windows XP could become an easy target for hackers and other malicious activity.  For business users we would always recommend upgrading desktop operating systems before support ends.

The Kent 2020 Event is on tomorrow, Thursday 25th April, at the Kent Showground, Detling.

We look forward to welcoming you to our stand, 119. Come and meet our team and try your luck at our competition, you could win either a £100 Red Letter voucher, £50 Capital Bonds shopping vouchers or a bottle of champagne.

If you are unable to make the show but would like to know more about Select Technology and what we have to offer then give us a call on 01892 830111 or visit our website, www.itsupport.co.uk.

We are based in Paddock Wood in Kent and have been established since 1994.

Come aboard the Westcoast Bus……We are extremely lucky to have secured this famous training bus on Wednesday 1st May at our offices in Paddock Wood. There will be a number of interactive demo based modules throughout the day, all are designed to be beneficial in the smooth running of your businesses IT.

We are limited to numbers so if you would like to join us then please book early to secure your place, refreshments will be available throughout the day.

For more information please contact Penny Scott on 01892 830111.

Remote monitoring utilises a secure, encrypted internet connection between a small software agent running on your server or PC and our central monitoring server. This allows us to monitor your critical systems on a 24/7 basis, giving us a real-time view of device availability, performance data and utilisation statistics. We are automatically alerted when a defined threshold is breached meaning potential IT issues are addressed before they escalate into disruption and downtime

Call us on 01892 830111 to request more information or to arrange for a call back to discuss how System Monitoring could work for you.

Select Technology had a stand at the East Sussex County Councils ‘Bursars and Business Managers Conference 2013′ at the Amex Stadium in Falmer. We raffled a Samsung Galaxy Tablet and the lucky winner was Janice Tolley from St Andrews CE Primary School in Eastbourne. Well done Janice.

In our quest for service excellence and after months of research and testing, we have now purchased our replacement CRM and Service Desk software.  This fantastic new system will help us to offer our clients an even greater level of service.   There will be many customer benefits, from enhanced reporting to dedicated customer portals, allowing requests to be managed seamlessly, improving communication for all.  We are obviously very excited about this new solution, and more information will follow shortly via our monthly newsletter.

Windows 8 will soon be upon us, and we have been testing the software over the past few months.  It’ll surely be a “Marmite^®” operating system – some will love it and some will hate it, as there are going to be some controversial and brave changes to the interface, such as removing the start bar, which has been present in the operating system for 17 years (yes Windows 95 was that long ago!).  Unlike previous operating systems, Microsoft are having to make this one cross-platform, as their up-and-coming surface tablet will use the new operating system, so there will be optimisations made for the touch screen navigation.  The question is will the clever chaps at MS be able to make a single operating system efficient intuitive and yet without compromise, because it will be a multi device platform?  Time will tell…

With the  imminent release of Windows 8, it seems Microsoft are not taking any chances on the hardware for their new tablet OS, by making their first Tablet ‘Surface’

A powerful and feature packed device, aimed as a rival to the iPad; features such as front and rear-facing cameras, an SD slot, and a full-sized USB port, along with some neat tricks: magnesium casing, DisplayPort out, Gorilla Glass, a kickstand, and Microsoft also claims Surface will have the best Wi-Fi reception of any tablet, ever. Microsoft will be launching two versions; a super skinny lite version (RT) and a thicker higher specified version named the ‘Surface Pro’.

The Surface can also be paired with a magnetic cover that doubles as a full, amazingly thin keyboard and multi-touch track pad.  In terms of availability, we only know the RT will launch alongside Windows 8, and the Ivy Bridge super-version 90 days later.

A spate of recent research has confirmed the worst fears of employers.  The majority of online shopping, personal e-mailing, and house-buying all take place during the nine-to-five working day.  If 1,000 workers each spent an hour a day on the internet, that would cost a company about £35m a year.  To add insult to injury, job hunting was amongst the most enticing activity for an extended period of cyber slacking and because non-business websites include more malicious code there is a greater risk of PC infection leading to unplanned business disruption and adding to your IT Support costs.

Here at Select Technology we understand the risks and processes involved in creating a safe internet policy.  The software we recommend for this important issue is Websense Web Filter.  This powerful tool can help you identify if internet abuse is occurring by silently monitoring usage and if necessary you can stop employees looking at inappropriate sites, accessing personal emails via webpages and using instant messaging tools, to name but a few of the features.  In addition the product allows for flexible reporting to analyse as little or as much as your company desires.