Those of us who have been through a hard drive failure know what real pain is! As a computer technician, it is no less devastating for us, all the same things have to take place after a failure, the routine is something like this:

• Determine the drive is indeed dead, have last rites, it was a good drive.
• Replace the drive in the computer.
• Format and load our operating system. (We do have the install disks, right?)
• Configure all the networking, ownership, accounts, etc. (What? No net access? Of course not, you don’t have the right driver)
• Load drivers for network interface,  audio, video and other hardware. (They are long out of date if you are using the original install media)
• Load all the updates, patches and driver updates. Windows XP systems may require 100 updates or more!
• Load your applications… Of course you know where the disks and license keys are.
• Find some applications online because they were downloaded. Guess what? Your key no longer works with the current version, your version is no longer available for download…
• Restore your files from the last backup you made. YOU DID MAKE A BACKUP, RIGHT?
• Spend the next week realizing you missed various things and fix those as you go.

Even for a seasoned techy type person, the time spent could literally be hours. New curse words will be invented. You may miss an important event like your son’s wedding, because this is far too important to put off.

There are many things that can shorten the time it takes to return your machine from a brick to a working system. You can ensure you have all your install media for the operating system and applications in one place, and that your product keys/licenses are tucked away safe and secure. Any hardware driver disks should be kept, and without question, you should always backup your system!

What if I told you that all of that can be avoided, and in the event of a hard drive crash or even a complete computer failure, that you could replace the drive, or failed system with another identical system, then have it running as if it never happened in about 20 minutes?

Through the magic of a “Bare-Metal Restore”, that is entirely possible! It is as if you went back in time, to happier days when the system was working correctly!

Many products are on the market that can accomplish this, but if you are using our Servosity Online On-Demand backup solution, you already have all the software you need!  You will require an extra hard drive to make the image to, a few minutes to configure it, and then let it run!

Watch it in action here as Damien Stevens, CEO of Servosity talks with Jon Evans, and George Law performs an actual restore:

We are so sold on Servosity that we use it for our own servers, recommend it to our clients and have partnered with them to offer it to you!

Convinced this may be right for you? Call us at 864.990.4748 or email info@homelandsecureit.com. Want a free trial? Sure you do! Click this link:

FREE Servosity Online Backup Trial! Click Here...

Say "no" to stacks of CDs

If you are using CDs,  DVDs, flash drives, external hard drives, or other physical media to backup your notebook computer, you are doing 100% more to protect your data than the majority of all PC owners!

However, you are also spending time connecting devices or inserting backup media and likely are manually starting the backup, leaving lots of room for missed backups. If you are using an external USB hard drive, you may be using the included software to automatically backup to that media when you have it plugged in, which could make for gaps of days, weeks, months, or who knows, even longer between backups.

Those of you who want to insure your data is backed up, automatically, without interaction from you at all, should consider an online or remote backup solution. These are ideal for a mobile computer, whether it is an Apple Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows or even a Linux based system! All you do is establish an account, install the software, configure the software for a time frame for running and you are done. “Set it and forget it” as they say.

When you have your computer turned on and connected to the internet, the data is uploaded to the remote server automatically and you get an email that lets you know that it completed correctly or that a backup was missed. You can see the backup details, you can set the backup to be “continuous” where your files are synced as they change, etc.

Your data is stored remotely on encrypted and secure servers. You can access a single file or restore an entire folder via the application or a handy web interface!

Here at Homeland Secure IT, we use, recommend and offer a free trial of Servosity Online Backup. Servosity is a locally owned and operated business here in Greenville, SC whom we are proud to partner with to bring our clients a rock solid, dependable and affordable backup solution. Servosity works with desktops, laptops, server (including Microsoft Exchange, SQL, and more!) and as mentioned previously, multiple operating systems from Windows to Apple Mac, to Linux, etc.

Free Servosity Online Backup Trial! Click Here...

If you would like more information about how Servosity Online Backup can help you or your business, or you would like a FREE TRIAL of the service, please email info@homelandsecureit.com or call 864.990.4748. We offer a full range of backup solutions, both physical onsite and remote.  Don’t go another day without KNOWING your data is protected!

Word travels fast on Twitter!  And word was that there were outages affecting some Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite customers over the past few weeks…  In light of that, Microsoft has stepped up to the plate with their Online Services Health Dashboard and made it available to all customers and partners in all regions.

This is direct from their newsletter:

Introducing the Microsoft Online Services Health Dashboard
Microsoft Online Services is pleased to make the new Microsoft Online Services Health Dashboard available to all customers and partners in all regions.

The Health Dashboard is a step forward in our efforts to continuously improve our ability to provide customers and partners with up-to-date, accurate, and complete information about our dynamic services. It provides a greater level of transparency into the status of all Microsoft Online services and tools with detailed current and historical information for our three regions: Americas, serving customers in North America and Latin America (NOAM); Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA); and Asia Pacific (APAC).

For more information on the Health Dashboard, please refer to the Public Announcement on the Microsoft Online Services Team Blog.

If you would like to see what all the hubbub is about regarding Software As A Service (SaaS), In-The-Cloud, or Cloud Computing, you can try Microsoft BPOS for free with a no obligation trial.

You get a virtual Microsoft Exchange server which you can use with Outlook Web Access, or your own Outlook, shared calendars, Microsoft SharePoint, and more!

Homeland Secure IT offers both Google Apps and Microsoft BPOS and can help you decide which is best for your application. Please email info@homelandsecureit.com, call 864.990.4748 or visit HERE for more information….

Just saw where another computer user in Greenville could have avoided a nightmare. They posted their computer was toast. Bad hard drive according to some geeky type people that looked at it. The computer is back to running, but their data is GONE.

Homeland Secure IT offers many backup solutions that can protect you from this scenario, but our favorite is Servosity Online Backup, which runs on your computer, regardless of the operating system of that computer (Server, Workstation, Notebook, etc) and quietly backs up your data to a secure server located “in the cloud”.

It is affordable, it is reliable, and the president of Servosity is an Upstate SC native. What more could you ask for?

If you would like to try this awesome online backup service, we offer a FREE trial, just call 864.990.4748 or email info@homelandsecureit.com for additional details or get setup for a trial.

Please do it before it is too late. Losing your pictures, music, documents, etc is a painful experience, and potentially devastating. The cost of recovering hard drives can be in the thousands!

Microsoft BPOS

Are you tired of dealing with POP3 or IMAP mail from your ISP? Tired of SLOW email? Do you want to share calendars between coworkers? Do you want to see the same contacts, calendar entries and emails on your phone as you do in your Outlook on your desktop and also via a web interface? Do you want your mobile workforce to have access to the same resources you do, including public / shared calendars & contacts? Want support for your Mac, Apple iPhone, iPad, Android, Blackberry?

Then Microsoft Exchange is the way to go, however, there are costs associated with hosting your own Exchange server that are unattractive to many smaller businesses.

Fortunately there are Hosted / In-The-Cloud alternatives, such as Microsoft’s Own BPOS, the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite which features a Hosted Exchange server, SharePoint, Office Live Meeting and Office Communications Online. Using BPOS can eliminate the need to purchase, deploy, maintain, backup and eventually upgrade a Microsoft Windows Server with Microsoft Exchange Server. The services are hosted “in the cloud”, in a data center, where all maintenance and upgrades are maintained FOR you. No need to worry with backups either.

This solution isn’t right for everybody, but it could be the answer to your problems if you have a smaller office, a large mobile workforce, a small budget or possibly no central location to place a server at. Would you like more information? Please call us at 864-990-4748 ext 201 or email info@homelandsecureit.com to arrange for a free, no obligation consultation.

Free 30 Day BPOS Trial

Optionally, you can sign up for a FREE 30 day trial of BPOS - Business Productivity Online Standard Suite - This trial includes 20 user licenses for Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting, and Office Communications Online.

Homeland Secure IT offers Hosted Microsoft Online Services including the full BPOS / Business Productivity Online Standard Suite (Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting & Office Communications Online) as well as the Business Productivity Online Deskless Worker Suite (Exchange Online & SharePoint Online), and each service individually.

If you are in the Upstate / Greenville SC area, we can assist you with configuring your Outlook to work with the Hosted Exchange Online service at your location or ours.

We also offer full remote support and phone support to clients anywhere in the United States.