How to buy a domain name in Australia
| July 26th, 2010 Posted in Small Business IT | No Comments » |
To start a website for your small business you need to register a domain that is either directly matched to your registered business name or company name, or is associated with your business. The rules according to the registration authority in Australia are:
- an exact match, acronym or abbreviation of your company, business, trading, association or statutory body name or words in your registered trade mark;
- or be closely and substantially connected to you because the domain refers to a product you manufacture or sell or a service you provide.
Costs to register a new domain name vary widely and domain name registrars in Australia vary widely in their pricing. Melbourne IT is one of the oldest registrars and hosts and at the time of writing the cost to register a com.au domain is $140 for 2 years. Another domain registrar, Netregistry, is also a veteran in domain registration and their costs for a com.au domain is $49 for 2 years at the time of writing. Smartyhost is an Australian domain registrar and host owned now by MYOB. Their com.au registration cost is $19.98 for 2 years.
If you’re looking for cheap domain hosting there are pitfalls to look out for with some registrars such as additional monthly fees to park your domain, or, when you choose a host and need to divert the domain name servers to your new host you may be charged an ongoing fee.
If you are going to optimize your new website for search engines such as Google you should ensure your domain is hosted on servers on the Australian continent. Many aussie hosting providers simply buy space on a server in Texas for example and resell the space. To achieve good positions on Google in the future your domain extension and hosting server should be regional. Choose your host carefully, ensure they are not listed on blacklists. Some cheap hosting providers may be hosting your website on a server with the same IP address (non dedicated) as spammers or unscrupulous websites.
Many of our clients are hosted with Smartyhost and we give them a high score for technical support that is local and user friendly, good hosting prices and services, and reasonable domain name registration fees.
Free Folder Syncronization or backup tool
| July 19th, 2010 Posted in Technology News | No Comments » |
Free file & folder syncronization software
The most popular file and folder syncronization toolof the last few years is Microsoft’s SyncToy to syncronize folders between two separate locations, such as laptop or thumb drive, and the desktop computer. This is a good tooland works well,but we came across another free tool that does a similar job that is very easy to use, has a clean minimalist interface,and shows file and folder activity during the syncronization process.
It comes from Budosoft, a company situated in Malaysia, who offer other free software which requires no registration or trial offers. This includes a free (non-trial) version of its software for internet cafes with a range of features such as billing, expenditure, lock screen, and password management. Tested in Windows 7 and services 11 PC’s and an admin computer.
Super fast USB 3.0 has arrived – so what’s available?
| July 18th, 2010 Posted in Technology News, Uncategorized | No Comments » |
We’ve been struggling for years with large file transfers and backups over the USB 2.0 protocol and it felt like USB 3.0 would never get here. At 10 times the speed of USB 2.0 it really is a milestone in technology. Backups and file transfers will be 10X the speed of current USB 2 specs. You can see on the comparison chart that you can transfer a 2GB HD movie in around 2-3 mins, compared to 12-13 mins on USB 2.0.
USB 3 performance chart
So, what’s available?
The new Gigabyte motherboards with P55 chipset have a USB 3.0 interface. At this time there are only two USB 3.0 ports because most plug and play devices are USB 2.0.
Western Digital have released two hard drives which support the new interface 3 series. One is the Caviar Black series available in 1TB and 2TB. This is a SATA-3 hard drives which will double the speed of SATA-II in current specifications. WD have also released the My Book external USB 3 drive. Prices are surprisingly reasonable at $249 for the 1TB model at time of writing.
Order a WD USB 3.0 with your new computer in Perth. For more specs visit Western Digital’s mini site.
Adding images to the Windows 7 Desktop Background Slide Show
| July 16th, 2010 Posted in Windows 7 | No Comments » |
The Windows 7 desktop background slide show is available through the Personalize menu (right click desktop – personalize) and is available for a geographic region. In Australia you will find only the Australian slide show background. There are others for various regions including USA and South Africa.
It is possible to add images to your regions folder and extend the slide show, even add your own holiday photos to the regional folder or create a new folder.
To access the folders and add your images:
- Choose start >R
- In the run box type “C:\Windows\Globalization\MCT” without the quotes
- Choose your destination folder
- Prepare your images in a photo editing program to be 1920X1200 with a DPI of 96 if possible.
- Remember when taking pictures to set your camera’s resolution for the optimum screen resolution.
You can also type “change desktop background” in the Windows 7 search box and browse for the photos you want to use. I find method above a lot easier to use.
How to build a successful online business
| July 14th, 2010 Posted in Small Business IT | No Comments » |
Winning Business Online Training links
Thinking about starting an online business? The Australian government has enlisted the Sunrise Show’s Koshi to present a series of tutorial modules called Winning Business Online.
The current government also intends to streamline the process of registering business names on a national level, rather than a state by state basis with separate fees being paid to each state government. This will make it easier for online business to protect their business name.
Another incentive for small business is the instant write off for assets up to $5000. This would be a good opportunity to buy your new computer or other equipment you need.
There’s more information about government incentives, tax breaks for smallbusiness and programs here.. We found government websites on these subjects to be outdated or hard to locate.
Does your Small business need an ipad?
| July 13th, 2010 Posted in Technology News | 1 Comment » |
Like many others I had some reservations about the ipad. There’s no USB port, no DVD draw, no direct external monitor support (vga adaptors are available). The keyboard is not designed for speed typing and your other hand might be busy keeping the device steady on your lap. It can only open one app at a time so you can forget about multitasking. How useful can it be for small business?
To answer my insatiable curiousity about a new type of mobile device people queue up to buy I went online to Apple and bought the ipad wifi model. I’ve now had the benefit of using the ipad for a couple of weeks and the ipad and I have become inseparable.
First, a couple of things out of the way. The ipad is not a computer, a notebook or a netbook – it’s an ipad? Unlike a notebook or a netbook the creativity of the every growing libraries of apps for ipad is surprising. The ipad is optimized for one app at a time because this is an ipad not a computer. Do you really need to read an online newspaper and prepare a spreadsheet at the same time? Once we get over that we don’t need to ask why it doesn’t have USB ports or a DVD drawer. If you want to read a PDF or view photos you can transfer them with itunes, download them off the internet, or use some of the apps below to transfer folders and files over the air.
Some apps come standard on the ipad. I use my ipad to view my daily calendar from Outlook. I get an appointment prompt just like Outlook and a big viewing area compared to my mobile phone calendar and contacts. Like most laptop computers in small, micro and home based business, the ipad will be used for more than business. This is a great chance to catch up on reading anything from online newspapers and your favourite magazines, to business PDF’s and charts. The ipad high resolution LED backlit display makes this an excellent reader and viewer and this is among my primary reasons for owning one.
There are over 150,000 apps, free and paid. Many are entertainment based but there are many categories with apps being added to all the time.
Some apps I found of interest to small business are:
Billings Touch
This is an app based on the Apple Design award winning time and tracking application. For mobile users you can track and create billing data on the go.
iwork for Ipad
well known to Mac users, iwork creates presentations, documents and spreadsheets. If you travel this could be very useful.
DropBox for ipad – Free
Install Dropbox on your desktop PC(s), then install the ipad Dropbox app. This is a great tool for sharing documents for example. Just drop the document (Word, PDF, etc) into the Dropbox folder on your Windows based desktop PC and it appear in an instant on your ipad.
Jumsoft Money – Free
The app for personal finances, reminders to pay your bills on time, and password protected.
Documents to go
DocsToGo lets you create, edit and view Word 2007, 2010, Excel, Powerpoint, iwork and other files in Dropbox (Premium edition) or direct viewing, creating and editing.
How to resolve Windows 7 backup errors
| July 1st, 2010 Posted in Backup & Restore | No Comments » |
Windows 7 has great new backup fatures in the business (professional) editions such as the ability to backup an image of the drive, in addition to file level backup. The best practice scenario is to do both, but with image backup turned off (unchecked) in the file level scheduled backup settings. Manually creating a backup image helps to mitigate risks associated with imaging an unstable system.
The new Win7 library feature allows you to add drives or folders to the library index but we have seen problems causing backup errors with reparse point folders added to the library. Win7 does not traverse reparse points but nodes added to the library as an added library item will be traversed. If you experience backup failed errors look in the library list in Windows Explorer and uncheck any added folders or external drives to test if this is causing the issue.
We have also seen backup errors occur when a folder container with music or videos is stored outside of the system designated music or video folder, such as on the desktop.
Sending large attachments that won’t get lost
| May 30th, 2010 Posted in Small Business IT | No Comments » |
Send Large Attachments with Outlook 2007
Programs for sending attachments at http and ftp have been around for a long time, such as usendit and others. Acrobat now offer a free program for sending large attachments that integrates nicely into Office Outlook 2007. Once installed you have the options for sending attachments like you normally would, or via the Acrobat plugin. What we like about this offering from Acrobat is it’s free, and the brand name is familiar to most internet users.
Windows Home Server for small business file sharing & backups
| May 27th, 2010 Posted in Small Business IT | No Comments » |
Small and micro business with 3 and up to 10 computers on the network, can avoid the costs associated with full server installations by using Windows Home Server for file sharing and automated backups.
Using a workgroup network often means backing up data from individual machines. This is a problematic way to backup data because backups are forgotten, or not backed up correctly causing problems when restoring from the backup.
Windows Home Server is a low cost solution (our Home Server with licences for 10 users is $1130 inc gst at time of writing) for small networks wanting the efficiency and centralised data storage of a server without the overheads of contract IT support services.
Dual Link DVI demystified
| May 9th, 2010 Posted in Demystify IT | No Comments » |
There seems to be a lot of confusion, both in retail stores and in the forums, about what Dual Link is and when you need to know about it.
Single link connections are most common, though many video cards now support dual link. A DVI single link computer monitor can display a resolution of 1920 x 1200. My Panasonic 42″ Plasma television is HD and has a screen resolution of 1024 X 720. Some much larger TV’s have screen resolutions of 2560 x 1600. If you’re using a HTPC (connecting your computer to your TV as a media center TV) you should check your user guides to see what resolution your TV is and whether it supports Dual Link. If there is no mention of Dual Link then it most likely doesn’t support Dual Link.
Dual Link requires the correct cable and, while not being directly related to screen image quality, you can have high resolution capability and higher (faster) refresh rates.
We have found Jemmell Cables in Australia to be a good source of online cables and advice.
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