Written November 2007
by Cliff Feldwick
Accountants are always telling you to go broke this time of year – not really (how would you pay them for the year-end and tax accounting if that happened?) – but on paper. Time to buy supplies, pre-pay your chamber and association dues, and buy equipment, especially if you can get in under the Section 179 requirements of $125,000 per year for new stuff.
So here’s my thought on that: buy computers. Now, I don’t sell computers, so I’m not pitching something here. Usually I’ll tell clients to buy Dell desktops or servers, or Dell, HP or Lenovo laptops. So there’s no hidden agenda.
But there are several good reasons why the end of this year is good. First, most of the manufacturers go into beat-each-other-to-death-on-prices mode starting soon. Not a surprise – they do that every year. Whether it’s to boost year-end numbers or to unload inventory and start fresh, who knows. But waiting till January is usually costly. Start surfing the websites of the above sellers now and don’t compromise – usually you’ll find the combination of unit and price that moves you. Prices change weekly, if not more often, so be vigilant.
Just as important this year is the coming disappearance of Windows XP and the forced sale of Vista only, sometime in mid January. Regular readers of my ravings (even if they could all carpool in a VW bug) know that XP is still available when you go to sellers websites instead of the mass merchandisers, and why I think it still is the way to go. But that choice will soon disappear. Don’t say you weren’t warned.
It will get better
Probably because of the major changes to XP that came out in its service packs (especially SP-2), lots of people are speculating when Vista SP-1 will come out. Last version of “don’t ask, don’t tell” from Microsoft is “first quarter of 2008”. The beta version is out now to the usual testers, and final version release usually waits until the bugs they discover are squashed.
Meanwhile, Microsoft is busy downplaying SP-1. First off, if they make it seem less important, it removes the “I’ll wait till they release that before I buy” justification for hesitation. Good for sales. Perhaps more legitimately, many of the updates that will be rolled up into SP-1 have been released and sent out via Automatic Updates already.
So if you are forced to buy Vista (or are afraid that Microsoft and others will stop support for XP before you’re ready to say goodbye to your computers, and so decide to go with the new), probably the best thing to do is log onto Windows Updates first thing and download and install them. Set some restore points so if it doesn’t work you can go back (a good idea for any version of the operating system). Then load any new programs and do your customizing.
When SP-1 is released, check some of the review websites and blogs before loading. Just Google “Vista SP-1” to find them.
Windows Home Server
I haven’t played with it enough to recommend or pan it (especially as an alternative for small businesses), but Windows Home Server has just been released in an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) version – which means very limited support. Shown last spring at the Consumer Electronics Show, it is quite a simplified (not in a bad way) version of Sever 2003 specifically designed to make backups and access to multiple PC’s in a home painless. It also allows remote access via the Internet to stored files, plus printer sharing, etc. Installing more disk storage is quite simple – it does that automatically – and mirrors drives so if one goes bad the data is still saved. Pretty slick overall, and the reviews have been good.
Several things are a little different. First off, the computer itself is designed to be a “headless” workstation – no monitor, keyboard or mouse (although if you buy the OEM version and install it yourself you’ll need those until it’s up and running). Instead, the box requires only a power cord and a network connection directly to your router (it’s assumed that if you want this product you already have several PC’s and a router). You access it by installing a control program on another PC on the network. Any other PC’s get a client program that directs them to the server for backup and sharing purposes. It requires that all PC’s have XP or Vista, and there are some services available for Macs and Xbox games as well.
Hardware/software combination packages will be out soon – HP is apparently going to be first out of the box on this – and will be reasonably priced (aided by the fact that no monitor, etc, is needed). Prices will be from $600 to $750, and will include up to four hard drives and the software pre-loaded. The software by itself (OEM) costs about $160 on the web. Not bad.
Cliff Feldwick is president of Riverside Computer Consultants and does data retrieval, PC troubleshooting and network setups for small businesses. He thought ahead about this column. He can be reached at 410-880-0171 or at cliff@feldwick.com.