Technology | eTop Technology

Have you been in a position where your IT network is down and support is nowhere to be found. At this point you are probably scrambling to find anyone who can help bring your network online. This problem usually occurs when your support company consists of one person and they decide to go on vacation without notifying you, or they are helping another customer. This can also happen with internal IT staff as well. If there is a time when your network is going to go down, it will be when your internal IT manager is away on vacation or is out sick.

This brings to light the need for a layered support approach. Business has to operate in spite of vacation plans and not having support in place when things go wrong is not an option. This is an area where a good managed service provider can really save you time, headaches and money. It isn’t enough to have one person looking after your network. You need a team that can have someone there to help you whenever you need it.

As with most issues it is better to set yourself up for success rather then respond to disaster when it strikes. An important way to do this with your IT network is to make sure that your support partner is a big enough company to be there for you when you need it. This will insure that you have not only redundant support but a broad base of experience and skills to keep you up and running. Even if you have an internal IT resource, it is best to partner with a managed service provider as well. There are many ways that we can supplement IT services to fill in the gaps whether it be adding experience and expertise or filling in when your IT manager needs a vacations. For more ways that eTop Technology can help provide layered support, contact us today.

When you purchase a new computer for your company are you considering the importance of the warranty and how protecting your computers with a warranty will effect your business? If you manage a large fleet of computers, you will start to realize how difficult it can become to source replacement parts, especially as they get two or three years old. Without a warranty you are stuck replacing your computer completely or searching on eBay for outdated replacement parts. For obvious reasons this is a poor use of your time and one that can be easily avoided.

As a rule of thumb you should keep your computers for no more then five years. At the five year point, technology will have changed enough that keeping the outdated computers will have a negative impact on the productivity of your staff and your bottom line. For those five years you can make the most of the life of your hardware by keeping your fleet under warranty. From a company like Dell, you can choose to buy your computers with a three year, next business day repair warranty. This will mean that as your computers start to show their age, you will have the assurance that a technician from Dell will be onsite repairing any issue that may come up. This will inevitably save you a lot of time not to mention money spent on replacement hardware.

At the three year point, if you choose to keep your computers for five years, you can purchase an extended warranty that will cover your fleet for another two years. If you choose to keep your computers past the three year point then it is especially important to make sure that they are covered by a warranty. It becomes increasingly difficult to source parts for any computer that is close to five years old.

You may be wondering how you are going to manage and keep track of all of your warranties even if you do decide to purchase them. This is what your IT partner is for. If you are participating in any kind of monitoring program with your IT partner, they will have the tools that will allow them to see the status of your computer warranties. In your quarterly review with your IT partner you will be able to establish a reliable system of replacing old computers that are out of warranty to make sure that your fleet is covered. By purchasing warranties for all of your computers you will be sure to get the most out of them for the entirety of their life span.

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