No IT Required – Top 3 Things to Increase Reliability

by | May 1, 2018 | Uncategorized

When it comes to your business and your technology, we all want systems that are reliable. No one likes a problem when they need to get something done. You do not need to have a high end IT consultant to come in and help make your systems more reliable. You can focus on these 3 simple things and they will greatly help with your reliability.

  • Backup Your Data – I’m not just talking about backing up your documents, but rather, backing up ALL of your data. Backup your servers using a platform that can do “bare metal” backups. Simply put, it backs up the entire server including Windows so you can recover the entire server if ever needed (and even boot it up on a laptop – not optimal, but better than no server access at all). You can also move to the Cloud which can mitigate the need for backups altogether. When thinking of your data, include things like firewall configurations and other systems that live in the server closet that can save a configuration file.
  • Standardize – Pick the best of breed systems and use them. You may get a good deal on a laptop from Costco, but then if anything goes wrong (hardware issue anyone?), it takes a lot more effort to get it all working again when having to manage and document a host of different vendors and machines. Plus, giving the user a backup machine is usually much quicker if it is the same model. Standardize on the same computers, laptops, tablets, firewalls, servers, etc. You will thank me later.
  • Redundancy – Having redundant systems ensure greater uptime and less of a chance for downtime. Do you need redundant internet connectivity? Maybe, and it is definitely worth looking in to. Just make sure it has two different technologies (for example, cable and fiber or even two different cable companies). If you have a server in your office, make sure it has redundant hard drives (RAID), redundant power, and redundant memory. Don’t forget to plug them in to redundant UPS battery backups too. Or better yet, retire the server and move to the Cloud since you cannot get more redundant than that.

I know this sounds a little daunting, but you can really do this if you spend the time to look into it. Whether you are working with an internal IT team or an outside IT firm, if you do not know what you have in place for these items, simply ask them for details. Hopefully you are already in good shape,  but if you are not, you at least know what you should be doing.

Need a second opinion? Shoot me an email at jahlberg@waident.com and I’d be glad to help.

 

 

 

 

John Ahlberg
CEO, Waident

CIO in the corporate world and now for Waident clients. John injects order and technology into business process to keep employees productive, enterprises running, and data safe.

Subscribe


Related posts

Interesting Tech

Interesting Tech

                      Hushme - A muzzle you wear for those important office calls that you do not want to be overheard. Or give one to that loud guy you work with to wear… KittyKorner – Turn almost any interior door into one with a cat door. The Edge Desk – Ever...

Security – Just Deal With It Already!

Security – Just Deal With It Already!

There are way too many stories about companies that discover a security breach and then find out that the actual breach happened months or even years ago. Yikes. No one ever wants to be in that position so why not try to avoid it? Krebs on Security wrote a good...

A Dark Web Story

A Dark Web Story

I have written about the Dark Web in the past, and nothing has changed, but I did want to share a real life story. Now that we have access to the Dark Web to run reports on client data breaches, we have seen interesting results. Only once did the report come back...

Subscribe to our blog!

Get our latest thinking to keep your people productive, your enterprise running, and your data safe.

Share This