Got a new PC for Christmas ... now what?

Sitting here on boxing day I am sure many of you are excited about receiving a new computer for Christmas. Hopefully all of you computer recipients will show the same level of thought and consideration that the people giving these very nice presents took when picking out your gift.

By that I mean, not just ripping open the boxes, plugging everything in and starting to "play" with your new "toy".

So what needs to be done to properly setup a new computer? Well let's start with a nice article written by Michael J. Miller of PCMagazine.com. His main points with my commentary:

• Make or create restore disks. If you computer didn't come with restore disks or a restore partition then be sure and create them either with the tools provided by your PC vendor or by using one of the many 3rd party tools available. Lifehacker has a nice article on the various tools available. Having this nice insurance policy allows you to restore your machine to its out of the box state should something go terrible wrong later on.
• Update your PC. Any computer you purchase is built at a specific point in time and so its software is out of date by the time you take it out of its box. The good news is almost any operating system that comes with your computer has functionality that will get you current if you just allowed it to its job. Just make sure you allow it to do its job when the software asks to do it.
• Setup your anti-virus application. Most new computers come with at least a trial version of an anti-virus app, so take advantage of what comes with the PC to at least give you time to install your favorite or figure out what your favorite app is. If nothing else start with the free version from AVG to give you at least basic protection.
• Move or install your software. You cannot just copy software from an old computer to a new computer, so you are going to need the installation disks, download locations and the various serial numbers associated with each application. Hopefully, you have taken some of my previous Technology Plumbing advice and placed a copy of all of your software in a common repository (such as USB drive or NAS box) along with their serial numbers. But if not, once you have gathered all of this, now would be a good time to do so. Remember if you are retiring an old PC, be sure and de-authorize the software on the old computer so you can properly install it on the new PC and do this before you shut down the old computer. Software like iTunes is particularly sensitive to this kind of operation.
• Install the common plug-ins and utility software. Many computers come pre-installed with some of these utilities, but be sure to upgrade what comes with the computer and install what does not come with the computer. Some of my favorites include Adobe's PDF Reader, Tweetdeck for managing your social networking accounts such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc and RoboForm for managing passwords in a secure and convenient manner
  
• Develop a backup strategy. Hopefully you are already practicing what we at Technology Plumbing have previously suggested, if not this is the best time to implement a strategy that provides both on-site and off-site backups that protect you in the event of either PC failure or worse (fire, flooding, theft, etc).

In addition to Michael's ideas here are a few more:

• Remove the "bloatware" that comes with many PCs by actually uninstalling this software vs. just deleting off the desktop icons.

• Register your PC with the vendor or seller so you can take advantage of service and support offerings they provide.

• Synchronize your browser favorites using a tool such as Xmarks from Foxmarks

If you follow these ideas your experience with your new computer with help keep your holiday's merry and your New Year happy.

Outsourcing - Good, bad or just the way it is

I look at outsourcing from many different perspectives. Using my Economics education I see the movement of resources to places that have a competitive advantage over US resources as logical.

From my business background I see the need to continually drive down the cost of doing business as a business imperative. Everyone else is doing it mentality, so if I don't drive down my costs I will be at a competitive disadvantage compared to others in my space. With this being said, companies saying they are opening off-shore locations to enable them to do business around the world, need to be honest with themselves and their employees and say it is all about saving money, because that is what it is really about.

From a public policy perspective it is never a good thing to see good, well-paid jobs leave the country. But even with a "free-trade" policy it is not a good thing to encourage this type of job loss via a tax policy that puts American workers at an even more of a disadvantage. It is important for public policy to put American workers in their best competitive position (in spite of our higher standard of living) .

From an individual perspective I see outsourcing as a threat to my economic security as well as my ability to grow my compensation given the additional competition off-shore resources provide. I also use this threat as a constant pressure on myself to keep current and keep myself in a position to be a valuable contributor to my company's success.

Finally, I wanted to share another perspective from Ron Hira, a professor at Rochester Institute of Technology and author of Outsourcing America about other ways the outsourcing trend is hurting our competitive position in the world. Ron's interview with ComputerWorld is quite enlightening.

So to answer the question I posed in my post title, is "Outsourcing - Good, bad or just the way it is?" The answer is all of the above and more. It is good for global companies, bad for US domestic companies and individuals. It also is just the way it is, but that doesn't mean we (the proverbial "we") can't do something about.

We all need to do everything we can for ourselves to make sure we stay as competitive and valuable as possible with education in every way possible, not just formal schooling, but continual learning from our experiences and our networks. We also need to work with our public officials both elected and appointed to ensure our public policies put us all in the best possible position. This is no different then how we work with our managers to ensure they understand all of the good things we do for our companies and the value proposition we individually bring to the table.

Finally, because there are no guarantees in life, we must all have contingencies in case our best laid plans don't pan out.

I recognize this as a different kind of post than you may be used to reading about in Technology Plumbing, but I hope it inspires you to at least think about the outsourcing topic and perhaps inspires you to comment on this post or even better do something that impacts this trend.

As always, these views and comments are my own and do not reflect or represent my employers or anyone else I may be associated with now or in the future.

Technology comes to the old fashioned check

I am sure many of you have seen the Bank of America commercials with their slick "deposit automation" features where you feed your check directly into the ATM machine and it prints the check image right on your ATM receipt. Those images are then available via your on-line access.

These new ATM machines from Diebold are part of how the banking industry is applying technology to improve their efficiency, which will help their bottom line (and maybe hold down some of those outrageous fees).

Another good example of applying technology is USAA's Deposit@Home which allows you to scan in checks from your home scanner and "deposit" the images into your account. This not only saves your bank money, but saves you the time from going to the bank or finding a friendly ATM.

Now as a technologist, I always like to take note when technology delivers great business value, but in all fairness there is a certain amount of negative postings and comments about some of this automation. The tone of these comments indicate there may be a few glitches still to be worked out, such as the inherent inefficiency of having to feed in each check individually vs. stuffing them all into a single envelope and processing them all at once. One only needs to look at the trade-offs we make with cell phones to see we are willing to trade off some quality and reliability for the right amount of convenience.

When an old fashioned processes like check processing can benefit from technology it is time to think about all of the things we do day to day and find ways to advantage of technology in new ways to improve their efficiency and your bottom line. If nothing else, be sure you take advantage of the efficiencies your bank is offering you.

Thoughts on blogging

I read Peter Kim's latest blog post today and was immediately moved to write a blog entry about his blog entry.

In his post he lists 5 thoughts on blogging:

1. Once momentum is lost, it's a lot easier for the blog to remain at rest. For all the physicists out there, there's no lack of force around here, but it has been driving business activities other than the blog.
2. The blogs I've followed since "the early days" of social media post much less frequently today. That contributes to a lack of great content to react to.
3. Audiences and attention have fragmented wildly. The growth of other platforms (e.g. social networks, Twitter, Tumblr, Posterous) has clearly cut into the time and attention paid to blogs.
4. Even ego traps don't work well anymore.
5. Not posting on a blog reminds me of that Geico commercial - it's just sitting there watching at you, waiting for you to post again.

Now I know very few of my Technology Plumbing readers care about why I write a blog or what Peter Kim thinks about writing blogs but his points seemed so spot on to the challenges of writing a blog I had to share.

What my readers care about, at least I think what they care about, is information on technology that can be used to help their business and their personal lives. With that said Peter's comments are applicable to not only writing blogs but about staying focused on what is important to you and your business given the challenges and competing interests we face every day.

Let me know your thoughts on Peter's thoughts and what they meant to you.

Things taken for granted no more

As we get near year-end and people and business start making plans for 2010 I thought it made sense to review some of the things we take for granted to see if really should continue to assume we have to do business these same ways in 2010

• Phone Service - At our houses most people still have land lines or VOIP services directly associated with their homes, while more and more of our voice usage is via cell phones. At what point will your land lines / VOIP go away and you will rely totally on your cell service? For me, the only folks who call my home phone are the many telemarketers I ignore based on their CallerID. Once my last child heads off to college this coming fall my VOIP service will be gone (sorry Vonage).

• Satellite Radio - A few years ago, it seemed like Satellite radio was the way to go for getting commercial free radio and the programming you wanted. Today the progress that Internet Radio has made makes Internet Radio a viable option for many homeowners and small business. Take a look at your ROI for picking up a dedicated Internet Radio device or just connecting an old PC to your existing sound system vs. paying those monthly fees to Sirius / XM.

• Cable Service - You may or may not be ready to cut the cord with your cable provider (unless they are also your broadband service provider) in lieu of getting your TV shows via many of the Internet options available. But you may be able to at least cut back some of the channels you subscribe to as they may not really be used or moving to the web makes more sense.

While I have listed only 3 items above, tis the season to review not only these items, but also look at all of your recurring expenses and make sure you are not paying for services you no longer need or can get in alternative and potentially less expensive manner.

Share your ideas on what expenses you are reviewing as there are now better ways to perform this work or service.