March 2012
In this issue

In my time at PCS and with the help of our illustrious systems engineers, I€ve participated in hundreds of network health assessments. Today, I€ll take a look back and share some of the common and some of the bizarre findings these assessments have revealed over the years.

Backup and Disaster Recovery
There€s an old saying in the IT world: There are two types of people in the world, those who have lost data and those who will. If your company is lucky to be in business long enough, one day you will need to need to restore data from an IT services catastrophe. It€s a sort of an IT Judgment Day. The bad news for many small businesses is that their IT Judgment Day will also be the first time they get to validate their backup process (fingers crossed!). Here are some very common backup and disaster recovery mistakes we€ve observed and help businesses correct:

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"A perpetual tsunami."

That€s how IDC describes the current growth of digital information throughout the world.€

It may be an understatement.

IDC estimates that last year, despite the global recession, the so-called €Digital Universe€ grew by 62% to nearly 800,000 petabytes. (A petabyte is a million gigabytes.) This year, the Digital Universe is expected to reach 1.2 million petabytes.

Putting this explosive growth in context, IDC expects that by 2020, the amount of digital information will be 44 times as big as it was in 2009.

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With all the chatter about accessing data and applications anytime, anywhere it's little wonder that cloud computing has generated so much interest. Indeed, the proliferation of mobile devices, high-speed connections and data-intensive applications, have challenged many organizations to continuously meet the demand for more computing power. And that's why operating "in the cloud" makes real business sense for midsized companies.

Cloud computing, the thinking goes, allows companies to improve efficiency and do more with less - benefits that are attractive to budget-conscious companies with limited IT staff and resources.

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Organization and shortcuts are the key to efficiency when it comes to e-mailing clients, customers and co-workers.

Responding in a timely manner is crucial to business, so keep these Microsoft€ Office Outlook€ tips at your disposal to stay current and organized.

1. Keep a tidy inbox

The most important thing to maintain is also sometimes the most difficult: a clean inbox. Don€t be afraid to delete! Having a spring cleaning session once every few months is good for the soul--It gets rid of clutter.

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