Virtualisation promises to cut energy costs, development time and development costs, as well as save money on your day-to-day running. But just how do you implement a virtual solution? 

In the last year, virtualisation has moved from a hot topic in the IT departments of big enterprises to something that every business is looking at. To those who have already moved to a virtualisation-based solution, the move should not have been difficult. The benefits of virtualisation are clear and have been outlined in previous issues of IT Manager (see box Virtualisation benefits). However, for those who are taking the first step the biggest problem is not calculating the benefits of virtualisation, but calculating what extra work the move will require, what the route to virtualisation entails and how they should proceed.

The first step should be to conduct initial testing of virtualisation software to get a sense of what the technology can do for your environment. Most solutions offer free downloadable trial versions. Next, as part of a staged approach, begin by planning a scaleable environment where hardware resources can be increased or decreased based on demand and software can run from anywhere. Then look at which of your servers in your current infrastructure could be possible candidates for virtualisation.

Choose a server that’s non-critical and mostly under-utilised. Generally, the benefit of virtualisation increases with the number of physical servers you virtualise, so any investment will only start to make good business sense when the environment runs at a ratio of at least three virtual machines per physical server. It is also a good idea to follow someone else who has already implemented virtualisation.

Addleshaw Goddard, one of the UK’s leading law firms, is one such business and has a few tips that new companies can learn from. The firm acts for more than 80 FTSE 350 companies and nearly 100 public sector organisations. Its 1,220 employees, including 162 partners, are based in three UK cities – London, Leeds and Manchester. A core aspect of Addleshaw Goddard’s business is to document production and client communication. To support these activities, the firm requires a reliable IT system that performs well.

Daniel Simms is Head of IT Operations for Addleshaw Goddard and his department faced a constant problem; each time a different application was deployed, a new server had to be purchased and integrated with the data centre. This was cost-prohibitive, a poor use of resources and adversely affected IT infrastructure performance.

The technical team also had to:

• Reduce data centre management time and complexity
• Ensure consistent infrastructure across all sites
• Control spiralling hardware costs
• Deliver a cost effective testing environment for future rollouts
• Meet demand for quick deployment of a training environment

Addleshaw Goddard first assessed VMware software as part of a tactical project to build two high-performance training and development systems quickly and cost-effectively. Running entirely on ESX Server, the initial VMware implementation hosted Interwoven’s Worksite Document Management System (DMS) and trained more than 1,000 users.

The deployment was such a success that Addleshaw Goddard has since used VMware software for every major IT project. The firm’s virtual infrastructure is comprised of management tools, Vmware VirtualCenter and VMotion that have transformed each of its data centres into a single pool of computing resources that can be tapped into on demand.

The benefits for moving to a virtual infrastructure included:

Hardware and management cost savings
Existing hardware is used more effectively with servers operating at higher capacity, while delivering improved performance.

Increased technical agility
Centralised application management allocates computing power to specific applications, guaranteeing optimal performance at peak times. Testing time is decreased – new servers can be cloned and provisioned in minutes.

Reduced server downtime
Virtual machines can simply be moved in real-time from server to server, so essential maintenance occurs without any impact to the end-user.

Staff efficiencies and improved customer service
Key business applications are quickly deployed. The high performance and reliability of applications in virtual machines leads to increased staff efficiencies and better customer service.

Virtual infrastructure in practice
With staff members accessing applications running in standardised virtual environments, ESX Server enables IT consistency and compliance across the business.

Controlling IT resources across offices in four different locations, as well as a separate disaster recovery site, yields considerable management instant provisioning capabilities of VirtualCenter have simplified this task while reducing administration time.

VMotion provides the ability to move virtual machines between physical servers in real time, and is used by Simms and his team to eliminate downtime and carry out testing procedures.

They are frequently able to conduct server maintenance in the middle of the day by simply moving virtual machines between physical boxes. “We have created an infrastructure for the future that gives us greater visibility than we’ve ever had before,” says Simms.

Lastly, keep your expectations low. Although there are many examples of users who have replaced tens of servers with a single server running lots of virtualised servers, you’re more likely to see reductions that are closer to six virtual machines per server.

Europeans go mobile

Europeans are hanging up on fixed-line calls as they move more to mobile phones, according to a report by research group Analysys.

The study examined the move to Fixed-Mobile Substitution (FMS) and the driving forces behind the change.

“In many markets it looks as if fixed-voice is going to suffer not the slow, lingering decline many have predicted, but a rather rapid one,” said the report’s co-author Dr Alastair Brydon. “At the current rate of traffic migration, 90 percent of all voice minutes in Finland will originate on mobile phones by 2008.”

After several years of usage stagnation, the average outgoing mobile-voice usage per subscriber increased by 23 percent during 2006, while five Western European markets have already seen more voice minutes originate on mobile phone networks than on traditional voice and broadband networks combined.

Record online sales

Businesses are being urged to invest in an online storefront after UK e-retail sales in July broke through the £4bn barrier, the highest ever for a single month.

According to research from the Interactive Media in Retail Group (IMRG), year-on-year sales growth for the second quarter rose to 52.5 percent, significantly higher than the same period in 2006 (35.3 percent), 2005 (30.8 percent) and 2004 (35.4 percent).

James Roper, Chief Executive of IMRG, said: “Consumers are embracing the internet, as people no longer need to queue at tills or plan their lives around shop opening hours. Any business without an online store just simply won’t be able to compete.”

Internet means business

More than half of UK small and medium businesses are using the internet as their main means of promotion and communication with partners, according to research from BT Business.

However, 40 percent of smaller firms have no dedicated website and 21 percent do not have any online presence.

Three-quarters of businesses see the internet as playing a major role in helping them achieve their business aims in the next five years, with 63 percent believing it helps them to compete with bigger players and in different markets.

Ninety percent of those surveyed said they preferred working with companies that had been recommended to them. European mobile use is on the rise

News in brief

First,  IT Managers feel they spend too much time on procurement and administration, leaving them unable to do their jobs properly, according to research by Probrand.

Of the 250 IT Managers questioned, nearly 20 percent of their time is currently spent on procurement and another 20 percent on admin. Fifty percent of IT Managers said price and 79 percent said availability of products were of high importance to their procurement activities.

Second,  According to the latest figures from analyst Gartner, more than two million PCs were shipped in the UK in the second quarter of this year. That’s an increase of eight percent compared with the same period in 2006, with the demand for mobile PCs the major driving force.

Third,  In-car navigation systems make trips shorter, safer and more environmentally friendly, according to researchers at the National Yunlin University of Science and Technology in Taiwan.

Researchers asked some drivers to use SatNav and others to use road maps. Their results showed that SatNav-aided journeys were around seven percent shorter in distance than map-guided ones in towns, and two percent shorter in rural areas.

The researchers concluded that SatNav journeys are better for the environment as they are shorter and use less petrol.

Switch the switch

The demands on your business network are ever changing and your old switch may not be able to cope.

Networks are rapidly changing. In the past, a network simply passed data from computers, servers and printers. The data was mostly text based, so ‘throughput’ was never particularly an issue.

Next came the internet, and the amount of data increased as users started to send and receive emails and view websites. Plus the text-based data started to be replaced by much larger multimedia files. Then throughput did start to become an issue, though most of the equipment could still handle the strain and you only needed to upgrade if you required the likes of video conferencing.

The latest demands of Voice over IP (VoIP) and remote working on the network means, however, that you will need to look at replacing some of the building blocks of your network. By replacing your telephone network with VoIP, you gain real advantages such as increased mobility, improved call quality and lower costs. But it’s effectively doubling the throughput demands on your conventional data network. Plus, because it’s voice traffic rather than pure data, there can be no delays. With date traffic, such as documents, the end can arrive before the beginning and the user will be none the wiser. But with voice traffic, it’s essential that everything arrives in the correct order – and on time.

Remote working adds another new set of requirements on your network. In order to provide remote workers with a connection to the business network, and access to the business applications and data, you need to be able to provide secure connections. Adding security requires additional computing power and older network devices simply can’t deal with the new requirements.

For your business to be able to face these latest demands, you need the very latest types of switch. Switches with Quality of Service (QoS) functionality and remote-access Virtual Private Network (VPN) security built-in, with the ability to deal with gigabit data speeds to connect to the newer faster devices, mean that your business will be able to cope with the latest network challenges. As a minimum, a new network switch should ideally include the following:

• VoIP QoS – To enable voice communication without any data loss or delays
• VPN – To maintain security for remote users
• A firewall – To protect against outside intrusion
• Wireless – Wireless networking, ideally 802.11n
• Gigabit ports – Many newer servers and network storage devices include gigabit connections and should not be limited by the switch

If your next switch includes all of the above features, then you’ll not only have enough capacity to cope with your users’ demands now, but you’ll also have enough capacity to take your business through for the next five years.

The server and network are at the heart of your business, so it’s essential that they operate effectively. Here’s how our server and network maintenance service can help

Whether you’re a small or medium-sized company, IT will be at the heart of your business. The two lynch pins of your IT infrastructure are the server and the network, and it’s essential that both systems are secure, function at all times and don’t cause bottlenecks.

The responsibility for security and IT often falls to someone who already has a full-time role and who is at best an IT ‘generalist’ rather than a specialist. There are two options available to any company in this position: either you recruit a specialist in-house or you outsource support to a third party.

Recruiting a specialist however doesn’t really solve the problem, specialists still need to take time off and no single person could possibly hope to keep up with all the latest software and technologies, plus they’re also very expensive.

Outsourcing is the ideal solution for 99 percent of companies where IT is a support mechanism rather than central to their business.

Getting Remote IT Management (RITM) from PC World Business puts all the resources of a fully functional IT department at your disposal, including:

• Network management and support
• Software updates
• Server security
• Administration and diagnostics

What makes RITM so unique is that it’s professionally managed remotely, so you don’t ever have to worry about the service. The system constantly monitors your network performance via a broadband feed to PC World Business’ network operations centre providing RITM with detailed feedback of your network and the demands you place on it. With this knowledge, your system can be reconfigured remotely and in real time. In addition, RITM can also examine the configuration of each PC on your network and compare it to the needs of its user.

You can call the RITM team any time between 8am and 6pm, Monday to Friday and as often as you like. In addition, you also get a telephone helpdesk facility that gives PC users in your office direct access to a PC World Business engineer.

Every call is usually answered within three rings and seventy percent of callers are up and running again within 15 minutes.

RITM is like a virtual Systems Manager that never sleeps or goes on holiday. For more details, call Rachel on 0844 871 2601 or email ritmsales@pcwb.com

Case study: Avery Emerson

Avery Emerson solicitors is an established law firm providing legal services to a wide range of clients, from large corporate organisations with breach of contract issues to individuals who wish to buy or sell their house.

The firm’s employees use a mixture of desktop and notebook computers with access using broadband and Voice over IP (VoIP) telecom systems.

Their IT infrastructure and support is fundamental to their success but in the past their IT setup was lacking, Avery Emerson’s Suki Ahluwalia explains. “We were previously using an IT support company to manage our network but the arrangement wasn’t working.”

Ahluwalia eventually selected the PC World Business Remote IT Management service (RITM). “RITM enables us to meet our objectives in servicing our clients. The added value of RITM is that they are only a phone call away and they have a team of experts who do actually care.”

PC World Business provided an on-site engineer to install the network and ensure that any technical issues could be resolved immediately and at a fraction of the cost of a full-time IT professional.

Software is often overlooked when it comes to seeking cost savings, but by using software licensing it is possible to save money and create real business advantages

Purchasing business software can be a complex process, especially if you are a growing company and buying for more than one PC. For most business there are three different ways to buy your software: Full Packaged Product (FPP), Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) or through licensing.

Boxed (FPP) software is ideal for the single user and comes complete with an installation CD and instruction manual. It can be transferred from one PC to another, but it is the most expensive of the options.

OEM software is a cheaper alternative to boxed software, however, it lives and dies with the machine it is installed on. This means that you are not able to transfer from one machine to another, unlike either boxed or licensed software.

If you require software for more than one user, then licensing is the best option as it is easy to deploy and manage multiple licences. It also has additional benefits over boxed and OEM, including the option of maintenance and substantial cost savings.

Through Microsoft licensing you can expand your software licences efficiently and quickly. And there are additional discounts available as your business grows, which is particularly the case if you work in the public sector.

For the IT manager (or the person looking after the software in your company), licensing has lots of advantages. Instead of having to buy and store multiple boxes for a single piece of software that you want to install on more than one machine – all volume licences are managed online. Also, volume licensing allows you to create a standard software image and use it across other machines in your network. Downgrade rights also allow you to use any older version of the software for which you are licensed.

With licensing there is also the option to purchase software maintenance, for example Microsoft Software Assurance (see above right for further information). This entitles you to a number of benefits including upgrades to the very latest version of the software, free training and technical support. Licensing is a flexible long-term solution, and consequently the total cost of ownership can be much lower than the other options currently available.

For more information please contact the licensing team on 0161 447 3123 or email licensing.team@pcwb.com

Adobe offers discount program

Adobe Transactional Licensing Program (TLP) makes it easy for organisations of all sizes to get the benefits of volume ordering. There are no membership requirements and you receive points for every eligible order of a new or an upgrade of an Adobe software licence, or of an Upgrade Plan. Your discount level is based on the total point value of your transaction – the more you order in a single transaction, the greater your discount level. In addition, when you order products through the TLP, Adobe provides you with an easy-to-use licensing website that simplifies software administration and record-keeping. The TLP is open to commercial, educational, and government organisations, and is even available for just one user.

Microsoft Software Assurance

Microsoft Software Assurance (SA) is a comprehensive maintenance program that helps you to get the most out of your software investment. It combines the latest software with phone support 24 hours a day, seven days a week, on partner services, training and IT tools that help you install and manage the software. No matter what level of assurance you have, you are entitled to unlimited online support during business hours. With SA you are entitled to new versions of software released during the term of your agreement, meaning you can take advantage of the latest technology and the opportunity to upgrade without any additional cost. SA customers also receive training vouchers for Microsoft Certified Partners for Learning Solutions (CPLS), which means you can train your staff to install, maintain and support your new software. Finally, if you are running server software then SA allows you to create a ‘cold’ back-up server for disaster recovery. Should the server crash, production mode ensures that users are still able to access critical data and applications.

Investing in IT can be costly but you needn’t pay upfront. By spreading the cost, you could help free up the capital in your business, pay less tax and avoid taking out a major loan

When you’re expanding your business, the last thing you want to do is spend all your much needed cash upfront. Ideally you want to pay as you grow or as the new expansion starts to bring in revenue. Unfortunately business expansion and growth all usually involve a move to new IT equipment, which is costly if bought outright and adds even more pressure on cash flow.

If you haven’t got the cash upfront then there are three basic choices: hire-purchase, finance leases and operating leases. Both hire-purchase and finance leases involve owning the equipment at some point, and incur costs for capitalisation and depreciation. Also, while some of the payments and VAT can be tax deductible, they’re not as tax efficient as operating leases.

With an operating lease you simply rent the equipment you need for a term – and at the end of that period you have the option to continue renting, start again with new equipment or to simply buy the equipment outright at current market value. Because you’re spreading your payments over the useful life of the equipment you buy, you save capital for other major purchases.

There could also be tax benefits to renting rather than buying. You may be able to claim the whole cost of computer rental as a business expense – offsetting the full amount against your profits and lowering your tax bill at the end of the year.

By contrast, if you were to buy a computer your initial outlay would be considered a capital asset – and because the Government has recently stopped offering 100 percent capital allowance on computer equipment in the first year for small businesses, buying it outright is less tax efficient than it used to be.

With an operating lease, the asset – in this case, your IT equipment software and hardware and services – is rented for a period and then returned to the owner. The asset is not capitalised, the rental payments charged to your profit and loss account are fully tax deductible, and the VAT part of the rental cost will be recoverable providing the asset is used for business purposes. Under tax rules, even software is sometimes considered a capital asset if it is an endurable product rather than, say, an update that has only a short useful life.

There are also benefits to renting when the equipment comes to the end of its life. Because you don’t actually own the asset, you don’t have to worry about the disposal or the upgrade cost, as you have the choice begin a new renting agreement with new and more modern equipment.
 

SmartPlan

SmartPlan is an exclusive rental option for PC World Business customers

SmartPlan enables you to benefit from the best technology without having to purchase upfront:

• Spread your costs
• Keep more of your capital available
• No purchased-equipment depreciation
• 36- and 48-month rental terms
• 100 percent tax deductible*
• Up to £15,000 credit**
• Approval in minutes
• Any product on a plan, as long as each plan costs over £250 (ex VAT)
• Add products to match your needs as your business grows

Why buy when you can rent? For more information, speak to a Business Advisor on 08701 600 902

* All references to taxation, VAT and accounting are subject to confirmation by a professional advisor

** Subject to credit approval

For most businesses the server is fast becoming an essential addition, yet many operate at less than 10 to 20 percent of their capacity. We look at a few ways to stretch your server and streamline your business further

Most businesses never really exploit even a fraction of their servers hardware and software capabilities, but by adding extra hardware to the server – such as an internet connection, VoIP, wireless or some additional drives – and delving deeper into the software you already have you can take your business to the next level.

The human brain is capable of tremendous things, yet most people only use a tiny proportion of its capacity. Servers aren’t much different. According to statistics from Intel and Gartner, most servers are under-utilised, working on average at only 10 to 20 percent of their full capacity.

The internet plays a key part in any business, and with server software like SBS it’s easy to share a connection throughout the whole company – and that’s where most companies leave it. If you delve deeper into SBS, however, it’s possible to do a great deal more. With its bundled Internet Information Server (IIS) and SharePoint software, it’s possible to create your own internal internet portal – also known as an intranet – to share information throughout your company and to handle the booking and reserving of physical resources such as meeting rooms and portable projectors.

It’s also possible to use your server to create a central repository for business projects, with the server handling communication between the different people involved in the project as well as tracking shared resources, such as electronic documents. You can also open up the projects to external users, so your partners and customers can keep in touch with the project managers and see how their job is progressing.

Additional hardware that can be shared on your network includes multifunction printers, workgroup printers, scanners and Network-Attached Storage devices (NAS). By adding workgroup printers or workgroup multi-function printers to your network, you can make substantial savings – typically, total output costs can be reduced by up to 30 percent by moving to workgroup printers. If your server is getting low on disk space, then there is a quick fix available by using NAS devices: plugging NAS devices to the network means you can add terabytes of additional storage in a matter of minutes.

The latest use of the network is to abolish your conventional communications system and put it into your data network, passing all the voice traffic in your company over the network and on to the internet. VoIP enables businesses to make substantial cost savings.

Finally, most users today want flexibility, they’d like to be able to log into the office network remotely, yet they still want to be connected to the office network. To do this, you need to add a wireless access point (WAP) to your network. WAPs enable you to take your wired network and extend it to any device that has a wireless port.

If you want to know more about extending the capabilities of your server and network, PCWB would be happy to help. To talk about your network, call us on 0870 1600 902 or email expand@pcwb.com

Maintaining security

Security is one of the key problems with opening up your server and network to the outside world. If you are going to connect the entire company to the internet, then a firewall is an essential purchase. This sits between the internet and your network and blocks anything suspicious going into and coming out of the network.

The next step up from a firewall is a Unified Threat Management (UTM) device, which takes a firewall and adds additional features such as junk email filtering, anti-virus capability, an Intrusion Detection (or Prevention) System (IDS or IPS), and World Wide Web content filtering.

While a firewall or UTM detects suspicious data coming into the network, it still doesn’t pick up everything. So although it forms a good first line of defence, it’s wise to add additional other forms of security.

Using software like Microsoft SBS, it’s possible to set levels of security and privileges on practically anything on your network that’s controlled by the server.

Microsoft SharePoint

Microsoft’s SharePoint is one of the least well-known parts of Microsoft SBS and is under-used by most businesses. It enables you to turn your server into a centre for collaborative working.

Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) was first used in earnest when it was launched as a free add-on to Windows Server 2003 and was bundled in with SBS 2003. WSS offers basic web portal and intranet functionality and includes portal pages, team, document and project sub-sites, version-controlled document storage and indexed search capability. Using SharePoint, it’s possible to create websites that can be made available across the entire organisation.

THE POWER OF TWO
Compared to 10 years ago, the microprocessors that run today’s computers are incredibly powerful. Yet power comes at a price. As processing speeds have increased, so has the size of chips and the amount of energy they consume. This has also meant bigger fans to reduce heat and, in the case of notebooks, bulkier machines than many would like.

The good news is that Intel’s family of Core Duo chips delivers faster processing while reducing energy consumption in comparison with their Pentium predecessors – marking an important step in chip evolution.

As software becomes more complex, business users demand higher-performance machines to ensure applications run smoothly. Equally, everyone is now aware of energy issues, and no one likes to use more than necessary. Core Duo processors go some way towards squaring that circle.

As the Core Duo name suggests, the new chips contain two processors running in parallel – a configuration that offers faster processor speeds than conventional Pentium chips with similar clock speeds. In other words, put a Core Duo chip with two 2.3GHz processors beside a standard 2.3GHz Pentium and the former will carry out certain tasks or batches of tasks considerably faster. A dual core won’t double your processing power, but it should offer a performance enhancement of up to 70%.

Also included in the new chips is Intel’s Dynamic Power Coordination, which ensures that power is diverted to the parts of the processor in use at any one time. This enables smarter use of energy – a particularly important feature for notebook users.

Many notebook users have experienced the race to complete a piece of work before the battery runs out. And of course, the more power a machine uses, the faster the batteries drain. The new processors have been designed to ration power consumption, maximising time between charges. Equally important, Core Duo chips offer enhanced performance in a smaller package, paving the way for sleeker, lighter and (with smaller fans) potentially quieter notebooks. Meanwhile, desktop users will certainly benefit from the Core Duo’s speed.

Upgrade strategies
With Core Duo technology now available for notebooks (standard and slimline), desktops and servers, Intel is looking forward to healthy sales in 2007. The company has also launched quad processors aimed at the highend gaming and corporate servers markets. But should the arrival of Core Duo prompt businesses to consider an early upgrade to take advantage of performance improvements on offer? That depends.

All computers have a finite life span and, if you’re planning to replace any of your machines, then Core Duo-equipped computers are well worth your consideration – not least because they are the most advanced general-purpose processors available. If on the other hand, your company is using machines with several years of life left in them, consider upgrading to Core Duo on a case-by-case basis.

However there is an argument for switching if certain PCs are struggling with the demands placed upon them by applications. A key element of Core Duos is another new Intel technology dubbed Digital Media Boost, which has been designed to accelerate processing across a range of number-crunching new-media functions.

But what does that mean in practice? Well, anyone with graphics, video or digital music will benefit from the arrival of a PC equipped with the new technologies. Let’s say an employee is regularly converting batches of graphics files from one format to another. Core Duo processors are designed to handle that kind of function with ease while allowing the user to carry out other tasks – surfing the web, checking email, accessing the corporate database – while the conversion is carried out in the background. Likewise, burning a DVD while opening a PDF will put less strain on the system.

The microprocessor market seldom stays still. Intel continues to innovate, while its closest rival, AMD, has promised its own generation of quad core chips in the near future. That’s good news for users who will benefit from smoother running, greater versatility and – thanks to savings in space and power – more stylish and economic machines.

The notebook power boost
Now they have closed the performance gap on desktop computers, notebooks can be a wise investment. Even the need for a separate screen has advantages for business

The cost of notebooks has come down significantly in the past few years to the point where a basic entry-level notebook is within a £100 or so of a basic desktop PC. So there’s a temptation to replace any new PC with a notebook, but is that a wise investment? In the past the notebook’s big drawback was the lack of power. But that was in the past. The new Intel core-duo processors are now more powerful than most of the desktop processors in the top-of-the-range machines from two years ago, plus notebook graphics are just as good as the standard desktop machines.

Power isn’t the only measure though. Notebooks are designed for compactness first, rather than ease of use. A notebook will need a full-size keyboard, a mouse and another screen if you’re to get the best out of it. You may be able to cannibalise your old desktop for its display, keyboard and mouse.

However, getting another screen has big advantages. Most notebooks can drive two separate displays. So it’s possible to have an application like Outlook running on your notebook screen at its maximum resolution of 1024 x 768; meanwhile, your extension display runs an application such as Microsoft Excel or even a DTP application such as Microsoft Publisher that works best at higher resolutions like 1400 x 1600, which your notebook display couldn’t possibly work at.

In addition, Microsoft’s researchers in the Visualization and Interaction for Business and Entertainment group found that increasing a computer user’s display can improve productivity by 9-50%.

The other main benefit of a notebook is that you don’t have problems with synchronizing data – if you need to go out of the office all your data automatically comes with you.

Server Upgrade 

Servers lie at the heart of all but the very simplest computer networks. If employees need to access a database simultaneously, share files or access email when out of the office, then a server-based system is essential. Yet we only think about servers when something goes wrong. Hidden in discreet computer rooms, they are out of sight and out of mind. Faulty, ageing boxes can, however, have a big impact on productivity.

Like all equipment, servers fall victim to the ravages of time. Components age and fail and this means spending time and money on maintenance. There are warning signs, though – noisy hard drives and fans indicate
that something is not right inside the box. But even a well functioning system may not be up to the job. As businesses grow, demands on IT increase. Old servers become obsolete, either because hardware is underpowered or the software needs an upgrade. If a server is straining to keep up with demand the result will be a slow network – reducing productivity and staff morale.

There is one other reason why you might consider upgrading. After a period of time the manufacturer will support neither the hardware nor software. Unless you have the in-house IT expertise to maintain unsupported kit, it’s probably wise to upgrade.

So what should you be replacing? Confusingly, the word ‘server’ is applied to two different but related components. First there is the box itself, complete with CPU, hard drive, power supply and the rest. Then there is the software – a range of products such as mail, web page and application servers.

Consolidation
It is possible to upgrade hardware and software independently, but if you’re building a network for the first time or updating an existing system, the simplest approach is a hardware/software package. This way, you ensure that you’re getting software that matches networking requirements and runs on a hardware platform that is suitable.

You should buy with a eye on the future. If you plan to keep a server package for three years, buy kit that will allow you to expand as the business grows. And if you’re using several servers a hardware/software upgrade provides an opportunity to consolidate. Faster processing speeds mean you can put a range of functions onto a single box, saving both floor space and power. While consolidation isn’t always straightforward, an under-performing network can undermine a business. It therefore makes sense to review performance and upgrade, if necessary.

SECURITY ON THE MOVE

These days everyone has a mobile phone and many of us own laptops, while others may have PDAs and smartphones. Each device has thousands of pounds – up to hundreds of thousands of pounds – worth of intellectual property on board that not only could take days, weeks or even months to replace but could also jeopardise your company should the information get into the wrong hands, and may even ruin the company while it’s being replaced.

A global survey of 900 taxi companies carried out in 2005 by security company Pointsec shows thousands of valuable mobile phones, PDAs and laptops are left behind in taxis every day. In six months in London, a staggering 63,135 mobile phones (that's an average of 3 phones in each taxi), 5,838 Pocket PCs and 4,973 laptops were left in licensed taxi cabs.

These figures are alarming because in the three and a half years since the survey was first carried out, there has been a sharp increase in the number of powerful, executive-focused mobile devices being forgotten in London taxis: 71% more laptops and 350% more Pocket PCs were left last year than in 2001.

Keep it safe
A warning to the business community and individuals to be vigilant when travelling with their mobile devices has never been more relevant, especially as increasing numbers of people are using the latest range of ‘musthave’ mobile smartphones to store sensitive personal and business information. Many of these devices now have a standard memory capacity of 80MB, enabling users to store 6,000 word documents, 720,000 emails, 360,000 contact details or a mega 7,200 pictures. These newer devices can give a thief access to every detail of your personal life (including personal and private/family pictures) and compromise your employer’s IT security or give access to their commercial data.

Such is the power and the memory capacity of these new devices that Samsung has banned one of its own phones – the SCH-B570, which comes with an 8GB hard drive – from being used in some of its factories for fear they could be used for industrial espionage.

Beware – hackers can steal this information and assume the identity of the user both in their personal or business life. According to the Home Office, identity theft is now the fastest-growing crime in the UK and costs in excess of £1.3 billion a year. To protect yourself and your company, start by writing a security plan. It will help you to think about the potential sources of loss in your business and will help you to find suitable solutions to the various potential problems. There are five steps to creating a good security plan: audit, plan, execute, monitor and repeat.

Audit
Identify assets and information that need to be protected, including hardware, software, documentation and data. Review the threats and risks. Make a prioritized list of items to protect. Ascertain whether you need outside help.

Plan
Write procedures for preventing, detecting and responding to security threats. Give a framework for enforcing compliance, including staff policies. Identify who will be responsible for implementing and monitoring the plan. Agree a timetable for implementation.

Execute
First, communicate with staff. Second, train where necessary. Lastly, carry out the plan.

Monitor
Research new threats as you become aware of them. Update and modify the plan as changes occur in personnel, hardware or software. Carry out any ongoing maintenance such as backups or virus updates.

Repeat
Plan for a complete review and update six to twelve months after you complete the first plan or when your business goes through significant changes. The last part of the plan, ‘Repeat’, is just as important as its other parts because technology changes so fast that new threats and solutions are appearing almost on a monthly basis.

Once you’ve completed the plan it’s time to get down to the real work. There are two main approaches to mobile security: you can achieve it through hardware or software. Hardware devices cover the whole range of security, from actually preventing the removal or movement of your device by using cables and alarms, through to sophisticated solutions that use biometric fingerprint readers that prevent any unauthorised access to your information. Software also has bruteforce solutions such as encryption software (see box) that encrypts the entire content of a drive or PDA, through to firewalls and virus software that prevent attacks during the time you are online.

At a basic level you should do three things:

• Security mark laptops/PDAs
• Log serial numbers of the IT equipment so that they can be identified if stolen and recovered
• Keep backups offsite or (at least) awayfrom the device you’re backing up.

When you take out your laptop or PDA the biggest security threat is losing your device either through theft or by accident. The first thing to do is to make sure that you have a backup of all of the information on the device and that the backup is updated regularly and kept away from the device you’re backing up. This way, if your bag is stolen you don’t lose the backup as well. Ideally you should check that the backup is successful and is restorable. Many users who have backed up find to their cost that the backups they have been making are useless.

Need for alarm
If you want to prevent someone from physically stealing your laptop then a cable is a simple and cost-effective security measure. Most hotel rooms have secure points for the cable to loop through and this should deter the casual thief. If you’re outside then a portable alarm that sits with the device and goes off when it detects motion will be sufficient. Some mobile projector manufacturers have taken security a stage further, and have built in alarms that emit a high-pitched noise and disable the device permanently until a pin number is input.

Although these measures will deter the casual criminal, they still don’t prevent the determined thief. The next level is to protect the data on your device from anyone reading it, should the laptop be lost or stolen. The most sophisticated security devices are those with built-in biometric tests. Many PDAs and laptops have built-in fingerprint readers which only give access to the device or certain files and directories should the user’s fingerprint match the fingerprint stored on the device. Biometric devices are normally only added to top-of-the-range devices, but you can still get dedicated external biometric devices or combined mice and fingerprint readers that allow you to add biometrics to most laptops.

A simple way to make sure that nobody gets access to your device is to add a password to the system. Windows XP has built-in security that allows you to add a password to your system and most laptop and PDAs allow you to add a password. However, not everyone trusts this level of protection, especially as there are ways of circumventing both of these password systems that can easily be found on the Internet. There are also third-party software packages that encrypt your devices’ hard disk and will only unlock the information when you input a password. Most of the biometric and non-biometric devices use near-military standard encryption that is impossible for even the most determined hacker to crack. Even with the most powerful supercomputers it would still take them years to get past the encryption.

Passwords are an important way of maintaining security when you’re mobile but they are seldom used correctly. A good password has to be complicated – the more complicated the better. Ideally it should combine numbers, letters and some special characters together; be about 15 characters or more long; and ideally not be related to anything that people can guess easily, so partners’ names, first names, models of cars, birthdays and so on are all out.

Microsoft has a handy password checker www.microsoft.com/athome/ security/privacy/password_checker.mspx that tells you how strong and therefore how secure your passwords are. It also includes some helpful techniques on creating secure passwords.

Safety online
Once your device is physically secure, the next potential weak link is when you connect to the internet to send and receive email, or connect to your home network. If you connect to the internet using a modem then the chances of someone actually being able to get access to your data are minimal. Unless they hack into the phone line there’s little that can happen.

The biggest security risk here is a virus attack and your laptop can be protected with any one of the latest security suites on the market. These incorporate antivirus, anti-spam, and solutions for spyware and phishing, which covers practically all the security bases. When you connect via Wi-Fi on your laptop in a coffee shop or a railway station you open up your system to potential extra risks. A hacker could get on to your system, as well as into any network that you are attached to, such as your home network.

The best way to prevent external threats in this instance is to install a firewall on your system – or, at the least, to turn on the built-in Windows firewall. You should also turn off any sharing, or add passwords to devices you share on your laptop with others.

If you’re connecting to your business network and accessing files and data, you can increase the level of security by using a virtual private network (VPN) connection. A VPN connection encrypts information passing over the connection and additionally verifies that the device connecting is who they say they are. VPN software is built in to Windows but it’s not simple to set up, so there are both hardware and software systems to make VPN connections far easier.

What is encryption?
Encryption means converting information using a code that prevents it from being understood by anyone who isn’t authorised to read it. Files, emails, even entire hard disks can be encrypted. When emails are encrypted you get the additional benefit of being able to validate who sent the message and check that it hasn’t been tampered with en route.

There are lots of techniques for encryption. The stronger the encryption the harder it is for a hacker to decrypt the code using a computer. The strongest codes are military-grade, and are almost unbreakable by anyone unless they have supercomputers and a lot of time, but simpler kinds of encryption can be broken using a regular PC with the right tools. As a general rule the more bits used for the encryption the stronger it will be, so 128-bit encryption is stronger than 64-bit.

Profit from A to B
Every minute counts in business, and Satellite Navigation systems can show you how to reach your destination faster – whether you’re behind the wheel, on your bike or on foot.

For most businesses there are not enough hours in the day, and every moment out of the office is time to make up elsewhere. So any device or software that helps keep that time to a minimum is a bonus. A global positioning system (GPS) also known as a satellite navigation (SatNav) system is essentially a way of getting from A to B in the quickest time possible. It is a device that you can use in the car, on foot or even on your bicycle.

With a SatNav system all you need to do is put in the location that you want to go to – either the street name or a postcode will do – then select your mode of travel – car, foot, etc – then hit start, and after that the system gives you directions via the screen or the device’s speaker to your destination, and if you make a wrong turn then it gets you back on track.

In addition most SatNav systems will find you the nearest useful points along the way, which could be anything from restaurants to cashpoints or historical locations, if that’s what you’re after.

At the heart of a SatNav system is a GPS receiver, like an aerial, that detects signals sent from satellites. It uses this information to tell exactly where you are. When combined with other software, such as mapping programs, it can provide directions and route plans.

There are no subscription fees or set-up charges for the system because all that a GPS receiver does is pick up a signal. What you will pay for is the up-to-date maps and the software that translates the GPS to a point on the map.

As long as your GPS unit has line of sight with the sky it will work anywhere, at any time, in any weather conditions, on land, at sea, or in the air. The accuracy of a position determined with GPS depends on the type of receiver but most hand-held GPS units are accurate to within 10-20 metres. SatNav packages come in many different configurations. There are:

Dedicated GPS
These devices are built solely to provide positions and directions. They often offer the best reception and, therefore, can show your correct position to within a few metres. These all-in-one systems have maps and other software pre-installed and are often very easy to set up.

PDA GPS
PDA GPSs are an all-in-one tool as well as a GPS system: they’ll include word processing, contacts, and spreadsheet software, email, web browsing, and more. Most are based on Microsoft Windows’ Mobile 5.0, Pocket PC 2003 or the Palm operating system. Combined PDA GPS systems allow you to organise your life, take your documents everywhere and always know where you are.

Mobile phone GPS
Smartphones are the next generation in mobile phone technology. As well as having the usual phone, text and mobile internet capabilities, you can also navigate using your handset, which also means you will always have your GPS system to hand.

Software GPS
Laptops can be used as SatNav systems; all you need is an external GPS receiver and the software and maps installed on your laptop. The advantage is there’s no need for a new product, but the downside is that the battery life of most laptops is too short for long journeys, although you could invest in a 12V car battery laptop power supply. Most of the systems also have the option of adding live traffic information to the SatNav system – which is usually charged as an extra monthly cost. This combination will help to get you from A to B and it will route you around any traffic problems so you need never sit in a traffic jam again.

The device you choose depends on how comfortable you are with the technology. The all-in-one device is a good all-rounder, but it lacks the simplicity of the dedicated devices as well as being more expensive. The mobile SatNav solution is good but the handset screens, especially on the more portable smartphones, are small and are
limited in the detail they can display.

Q&A

Q A senior manager’s notebook has broken down. The hard drive contains vital customer information. Can the data be recovered?
A This is an object lesson in why data should always be backed up. It isn’t always easy to recover lost information. However, if the hard drive is intact, it can be removed from the notebook and its data retrieved. The easiest way to do this is to buy a USB enclosure. These devices fit notebook and PC drives, and allow data to be recovered to another computer via a USB cable.

Q I’ve heard that manufacturers provide software updates to improve performance and fix security holes. How can I access these?
A As a default setting, Microsoft provides automatic updates of Windows XP whenever you connect to the internet. However, if you want updates for Office applications such as Word, you may have to carry out a periodic availability check. Go to Help, and select ‘check for updates’. Many other software providers run a similar system.

Q I run a small company and most of my staff use Wi-Fi-enabled notebooks. I want to set up a wireless network but are they secure?
A An unprotected wireless network is not secure, so you will need to switch on your router’s encryption function. Older routers came equipped with WEP (wireless equivalent privacy) encryption, but this has been superceded by WPA (Wi-Fi protected access), a much more robust system. However, if you are running WPA you will need to ensure that all your network cards are compatible.

Q Some of the PCs in our office seem to crash with alarming regularity, and I think it’s a drive or a file problem. Is there a simple way to check if any files are corrupt?
A If you’re regularly encountering errors (such as warnings of missing DLL files or of programs not loading) and you think that some part of your operating system may be to blame, you can check your system files. Go to Start, click Run and type in sfc/scannow. This will check all your crucial Windows system files to see if they’ve been edited or modified. If they have, you should be able to replace them with backups, or with your Windows CD.

Q How do I get more programs to appear in the Start menu?
A The Start menu includes shortcuts to your six most frequently used programs by default. If you’d like to access more programs, right-click the Start button, select Properties and click Customize. In the centre of the Customize Start Menu box, click the up arrow to select the number of programs you’d like to have on show.

Q Is there a quick way to lock my computer?
A You can lock your computer with a single click. Right-click on an empty area of your desktop and select New > Shortcut. Type ‘rundll32.exe user32. dll,LockWorkStation’ and click Next before naming your shortcut. Drag this new icon to your Quick Launch bar and you’ll be able to lock your PC with a single click. Alternatively, go to Start > Log Off > Switch User to display the welcome screen, complete with a list of available users.

Q Every couple of minutes or so, my PC accesses the hard disk. How can I stop it doing this
A The usual culprits are desktop search utilities, virus checkers, hard drive optimisers and tools that perform background tasks when the PC is not being used for something else. Press Ctrl-Alt-Del to bring up the Windows Task Manager and check what processes are running – look out for the Microsoft Indexing Service (cisvc.exe) which speeds up PC searches. To stop this process, click the “Start” button, select “Run”, type “msconfig”, select the “Services” Tab, scroll down to the Indexing Service and switch it off. Then reboot your PC.

Q I’m travelling soon and I’m not sure if I can take my notebook on board the plane. Is there any way to safeguard it in the baggage hold?
A You could buy a case, such as the Kensington Simply Portable Two leather case which has DropShield padding to provide shock absorbent protection. Back up essential files on an external drive just in case. Alternatively, set up your office PC so you can access it remotely. If still unsure, consult your airline before departure.

Q If I access my Outlook via webmail on a computer other than my own, could someone else gain access to them?
A There is always that risk but you can minimise it by using a U3 USB smart drive, like the Kingston U3 DataTraveler, which enables you to carry data, and U3 software programs that allow you to run applications and store all your data on the USB card.

Q My old PC is really slow. How can I get it to run more quickly?
A The quickest way to speed up your PC is to add more memory. If you’re running Windows then upping your main memory to up to 1GB should produce noticeable improvement in speed. However you could also try to defragment your computer. As your computer gets older the files tend to get split up into small pieces scattered over your hard disk. A defragmentation using the built-in Windows tools should speed up your computer.
Alternatively you could do an entire reinstall of Windows. But this should only really be done by experts, and only after a full backup of your drive has been carried out.

Q Is there any way I can access the files on my computer at work while I’m on the move?
A There are many pieces of software that enable you to access files on a remote computer and to actually use the applications on your work PC. Symantec’s pcAnywhere 11.5 is a remote control program that allows you to remotely manage Windows – and Linux systems – using a Java-enabled Web browser.

Q Is there a quick way to put an index on my Word documents?
A Start at the beginning of the document, and select the first word or phrase you want to index. Go to Insert, Reference, Indexes and Tables, Entry to get the dialogue box. Then click on Mark Entry to save the entry. When you’ve finished marking index entries, you can create the index itself. Place the cursor where you want the index, go back to the dialogue box and select OK, and the Index appears.

Q We’re donating a few old computers to charity. What can we do to ensure that all remaining data is removed from the hard disks?
A There are lots of programs that can undelete programmes so, to delete information effectively, the disk needs to be overwritten several times. In addition, there are some combined file transfer and deletion packages, such as Koch Media’s Winwasher for Windows, that can transfer application data and settings to new PCs and also rewrite your old disks’ freespace so no traces are left of your data.

Q My computer has started to run very slowly. What should I do to speed up its performance?
A Adding more memory to your PC should alleviate the problem, but if that doesn’t work then you could have a hardware problem. However, for most users the only solution is to reinstall everything from scratch. If this sounds too much like hard work, then PC World Business has a PC Healthcheck service that examines your PC, suggests improvements and installs any necessary upgrades. For more details, ring 08701 664 664.

Q Are there any Windows XP utilities that enable me to highlight folders in Explorer to make them easier to spot?
A In Windows XP, you can use a different icon for any folder. To change the icon, open Explorer, right click the application folder and select Properties. Go to the Customize tab and click the button at the bottom that says Change Icon. This offers a choice of standard windows icons or you can browse to find any icon you like.

Putting your calls over the network

In a recent survey, Alcatel found that 20% of calls are lost due to no response after five rings, yet with the right telephone system you can reduce that loss to a minimum. Your telephone system is the lifeblood of your business, yet the systems of many businesses are based on 1950s technology.

There have been three different generations of telephone system. The first, the Post Office Telephone Service (POTS) is still found in most offices up and down the land. POTS became known as the Plain Old Telephone Service – which describes it rather accurately. It’s inflexible, expensive and incredibly poor at scaling up or down – and it has also been with us since the 1950s. The next generation added some intelligence to the phone system and allowed companies to add things such as voicemail, caller ID, call waiting and three-way conference calling. However, it was still inflexible and hard to scale up or down. The latest generation of phone systems is IP (internet protocol) telephony. An IP-based system is scalable, flexible, much cheaper to install, and adds even more functions such as call queuing and the ability to push calls to you wherever you are.

Such a system will also connect to your computer’s contact-management and email software. IP telephony helps your company punch above its weight and look much bigger than it is. It also allows you to:

• Answer calls quickly
• Queue calls when required
• Recognise callers before answering the call
• Direct customers to the right person first time
• Get customer account information in advance
• Dial by name from Microsoft Outlook and contact management software

The main advantage of IP telephony is that it uses the same networks as your computer network. So, instead of two circuits, you only need one – and you can even dispense with the phone altogether and use the computer as your phone.

By integrating the system into your computer network, you can also integrate your telephony into your computer packages – which is sometimes referred to as computer telephony integration (CTI). So when a call comes through, you can see who it’s from – using caller ID as normal – but at the same time your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system can be looking up their records so you can, for example, see when they last rang, what they bought last, and if it’s their birthday. In addition, you can also dial customers directly from their record in your Outlook email or in the CRM system. But before you go ahead and look for an IP telephony system, there are some basic things that you need to consider.

Before you begin your research or invite companies to quote, consider your requirements in detail. Consider how many phone users (extensions) you have. Most modern telephone systems are scalable but it’s worth checking to see if the system will support a larger workforce, especially if you’re planning on quick growth. The first thing you should do is create a list of extensions you already use and put names and job functions next to each one, as this will help you to identify what each person’s needs really are. Write down the problems you face on a daily basis; for example, can staff easily pick up other users’ calls, and what happens to your callers if they call out of hours?

Connection to the outside world is simple – forget your analogue lines and install ISDN. Porting your existing numbers from analogue to ISDN lines is easy and relatively cheap. Smaller businesses can opt for basic rate (BT branded ISDN2) as opposed to primary rate (BT ISDN30) to save on costs. Features such as group hunting, pick-up, transfer, and speed dial are standard on every system, however voicemail, automated answering, call management and DECT (digital enhanced cordless telephony), voice recording, and CTI will be extra. You wouldn’t expect anyone to be able to install a computer network and the same goes for telephones. Telephone systems require professional installation and maintenance, so once you’ve got an idea of the functionality required you will need to look at the potential suppliers.

Look for an accredited supplier who can offer a complete suite of services including consultancy, installation, maintenance and project management. It’s worth investigating what the maintenance includes. Some maintenance services may not cover handsets and cabling, and if you’ve purchased third party applications from other vendors, these may well be covered separately. You should also check the maintenance response times – the telephone service is crucial to any business and any period of downtime will affect the company’s bottom line and credibility immediately.

The last thing to consider is cost. IP telephony systems are expensive to buy outright so most are bought via finance deals, or leased per week or per month. However, because most IP solutions include the ability to connect to the internet and share the same networks as your computer network, there are substantial cost savings compared with conventional telephone systems, particularly if you’re equipping a new office.

A typical small business IP telephony scenario

Problem
A small company with 45 employees sells products that it maintains itself. Its main site includes the head office, with senior management, sales management and administrative departments. A second site, some 20 miles away, comprises a warehouse and the offices of the aftersales service technical team.

Head office handles the orders and billing. It is permanently connected to the warehouse which prepares the orders and is responsible for restocking and deliveries. The sales department has an assistant, based at head office, who keeps track of appointments for the sales team and for the three representatives based in the provinces.

Solution
A solution such as an Alcatel OmniPCX Office would enable the company to benefit from more sophisticated, centralised and rationalized telecommunication resources, covering all its voice/internet and data requirements. An OmniPCX Office installed at head office provides a voicemail facility to ensure a greeting at all times. The personal assistant function enables the chief executive to have calls forwarded to his or her mobile when out of the office, or to a warehouse extension when visiting the warehouse.

The warehouse PBX can be replaced by a second OmniPCX Office to manage telephony, internet access and the LAN with a secure Virtual Private Network (VPN) link to the head office network. The warehouse, in addition to having broadband internet access, can be equipped with digital cordless phones for people roaming around the site.

The main site’s OmniPCX Office will provide the telephone services and email application for all company personnel. This will include the sales department, for receiving orders; the technical department, for dealing with customer service requests; and remote users, for communication with head office and customers. The company will have shared, high-speed access to the Internet via an ADSL link for managing customer and supplier orders, and the VPN solution for connecting remote users and the warehouse link.

Insider’s guide to looking good

The type of projector you need for a presentation relies on the environment in which it will be used, the size of your audience, the information it will show and whether it’s fixed or portable. The first thing you have to decide is if the projector is going to be portable or standalone. You also need to decide on the projector technology. There are two options;

most projectors are based on liquid crystal display (LCD) technology, where the light from the lamp is filtered through red, blue and yellow. LCD panels to produce a full colour image.

Digital light processing (DLP) converts the light directly into a full-colour image, which means they can be smaller, have a better resolution and are more robust, but the colours aren’t as lifelike as LCDs.

Brightness
In general, the brighter the output the more people can view your presentations. There are four primary considerations when choosing your projector’s brightness:

How many people will be in the room?
This determines the size of the projected image; as the image size increases the brightness diminishes.

How much light is in the room? Most meetings need some lighting for note-taking.

The projection screen Projection screens help low-brightness projectors to look good, but a standard office wall reflects light poorly so you need to compensate.

Your subject Training and workgroups need brighter projectors because of the need to see and read detail. Presentation graphics or video are less demanding.

Resolution
The resolution decides the quality of the image you project. Typical resolutions are SVGA (800 x 600 pixels), XGA (1024 x 768), SXGA (1280 x 1024) and UXGA (1600 x 1200). A typical laptop or monitor will have a resolution of XGA or better. In essence, the better the resolution the less grainy the image.

Contrast ratio
The contrast ratio also defines the picture quality. An average contrast ratio is about 400:1 for LCD projectors, and 4000:1 for DLP units.

Data and video inputs
You may want to project from a Satellite/Cable box, DVD player or games console as well as a computer, or have all the sources connected and interchange between them.

Keystone correction
‘Keystoning’ corrects the projected image so that it’s always a perfect rectangular shape regardless of what angle the projector is at.

Audio support (Speakers)
If you're likely to be projecting multimedia with sound, you can connect your PC or video source to an amplifier. Some projectors have their own internal speakers.

Lamp life
Projector lamp bulbs can cost up to £500 to replace. So the longer the half-life of your lamps, the better.
Nice little extras
An infrared remote that also doubles as a mouse means you’re not tethered to your projector and can move around the room.