Just A Word (or two) From Steve

Lync Integration with Exchange UM – The “SUBJECT” matters

steve — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 23:02:15 +0000

We recently installed Lync 2010 and integrated it with our Exchange 2010 Unified Messaging (UM). Everything seemed to go smoothly and we have since released it to all of our users. We are getting great positive feedback and wanted to enhance the offering. To that end, we started playing with Polycom CX100/200/300 devices (I hope [...]

Careful Client Planning Needed During Migration From Exchange 2003 to 2010

steve — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 00:48:48 +0000

We recently took on the migration of our enterprise E-mail system from Exchange 2003 to 2010. In this article, I want to talk about the need to understand your client connection requirements before taking the plunge. Like most companies, we are still on Outlook 2003 and Windows XP. Our remote users access the E-mail with [...]

Add-ADPermissions is not enough to read all mailboxes on Exchange 2010

steve — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 01:45:03 +0000

We have recently upgraded from Exchange 2003 to 2010 and we are still in the midst of the details. At first glance, it would seem that the biggest hurdle is to get a good understanding of the differences and plan your migration. However, we have found the undocumented details about how to configure a number [...]

Expand LUNs with ESX and not vCenter

steve — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 00:02:56 +0000

When we upgraded to vSphere 4.1, there was nothing different about the way we expanded LUNs. We have three EqualLogic iSCSI SAN arrays for storage and two IBM BladeCenters. If we needed more space, the process was quite simple go to the web interface of the SAN and expanded the LUN using vCenter, click on a host [...]

The Perfect Caddy- For Your Laptop

steve — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 22:26:03 +0000

My wife has been asking for a portable laptop cart for a couple years and every one that I have looked at had something I did not like about it. Either it was too large, too flimsy or unattractive. Well, this Christmas I was looking again and stumbled across the Mayline – 950 – Eastwinds [...]

Maintenance Mode Can Leave Virtual Machines Unmanageable in VMware vCenter 4.1

steve — Sun, 14 Nov 2010 00:45:24 +0000

We are running an environment with a single vCenter and 15 ESX hosts, of which 12 are in a DRS/HA cluster. When we had to do some maintenance on some of the hosts in the cluster, I moved a server into maintenance mode. Since we have DRS, the system attempted to automatically move all of [...]

Monitor Madness

steve — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 03:30:35 +0000

I started writing this article about eight months ago in February of 2010. Back then (yeah, it seems like a very long time ago), it was almost impossible to find any distributor that had decent monitors available. Everything was backordered and taking weeks or months to arrive. Like a lot of companies, we were being pushed [...]

Throw out your VPN – time to move to Juniper SSL VPN

steve — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 00:28:59 +0000

If you are running a dial-up VPN network, you know the nightmares about security, maintenance and the inevitable end-user problems from travelers. No matter how much time and effort you put into building that part of the network, it always becomes an source of irritation and constant frustration. The first and last issue is always [...]

Building a Green Server Room – Push Air Where You Need It

steve — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 05:47:14 +0000

Having optimized my air flow situation in the server room, the next step was to get that cold air into the servers. I have never been a fan or believer of using cabinet blanks to block off air-flow because I always thought that having air move through and around servers served a good purpose. Most [...]

Lenovo S10-3t Netbook

steve — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 01:22:43 +0000

We have decided to look at a few netbook computers for our employees that do a lot of travelling. While everyone currently has a notebook, the frequent flying executives and some others would prefer something smaller. Knowing that most of them use Windows, but have iPhones, I thought our first test would be with a tablet [...]