If you run a small office, you will know all about computer issues and printer error codes that only seem to show when you have important work to print. When you take a deeper look, you realise how much time is lost when trying to fix bluescreen issues and replace printer ink cartridges and that has a negative impact on your business operations.
We asked an IT support professional from Managed IT services Orlando for some advice for small business owners about IT hardware maintenance.
- Buying hardware – You have to buy a dozen workstation PCs, so you naturally look for the cheapest computers, which happen to be the lowest spec and in less than 2 years, this hardware will be obsolete. Invest in top spec hardware and you can expect at least 5 years of good performance; every office depends heavily on IT hardware and with the right spec, you get value for money. Take the amazing AMD CPU, one of the best processors, as an example; using these will give your staff the ability to instantly access data and this generation of CPUs will be relevant for a few years, if not longer.
- Fixed rate IT hardware support – This is the perfect solution for many business owners; you pay a fixed rate every month for 24/7 hardware support that includes everything from speeding up PCs to replacing major components. Many issues can be handled remotely, which is a win-win situation and the provider is dedicated to keeping your business online. There might be some months when you hardly need their services and others when there are many issues; either way, you are covered with comprehensive support.
- Back up your data – If you have lost data in the past, you know that feeling you have when all that hard work is gone forever; you can avoid this by setting up computers to back up automatically every few minutes and should a drive crash and the data cannot be retrieved, you haven’t lost anything. Storing data on the cloud is the smart thing to do and with professional cyber-security, your data is safe. Really precious data can be copied onto several thumb drives, all stored in separate locations. Click here for 7 tips to grow your business.
- PC Maintenance – We all know how dust accumulates everywhere and inside your office PCs is no exception; open up the main casing and use aerosol compressed air cans to blow out the interior – this should be done every 6 months.
- Install a firewall – If you’re running a Local Area Network with a Broadband Internet connection, your data is at risk of being hacked. For a few dollars a month, you can have good firewall protection, which, from the hacker’s perspective, is yet another barrier to have to negotiate. Ransomware is becoming common; this involves a hacker accessing and locking your data with digital encryption; when you pay the asking price, the digital encryption key is sent to you. If you had no back up and your critical design files were locked, what would you do? Going to the police isn’t going to result in a conviction, these people are too smart to be traced. Better to simply transfer the amount of Bitcoin to the anonymous Bitcoin address you were given and get back your data; the hacker doesn’t put the price too high and for some, the easiest way to regain access to your data is to pay the ransom.
- IT consulting – Investing in an office full of IT hardware is never going to be cheap and this is one decision you have to get right. Calling in an IT consultant is the best solution when it comes to buying hardware, as you will have a solid IT infrastructure on which to build.
- Personal devices – As a business owner, you have to decide whether or not to allow employees to use their personal devices to connect to your network. There are risks attached to allowing this; an employee’s smartphone could be infected with malicious software and once hooked up to your network, a breach could occur. You could ask your network administrator to create a whitelist of allowed devices, which reduces the chance of a hack.
- PC maintenance – There is special software that keeps your hardware running like it should; set times for maintenance tasks to be performed, while security updates can be automatically downloaded and installed.
Computers are unpredictable animals, as are photocopiers, scanners and printers and for many business owners, fixed fee IT hardware support is the best all-round solution. Consult with an expert before making any IT hardware purchases and take cyber-security seriously, as data theft is more common than you would think.