Small Business Computing Staff

ITBusinessEdge: Preventing Distributed Denial Of Service Attacks How do you prevent DDoS attacks on your small business website? Paul Mah recommends SMBs begin by designing their networks with scalability in mind, leveraging the cloud for protection and relying on a content delivery network. “I last wrote on the topic of DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) […]

PCWorld: Preview – Hot New HP Pavilion DM1 Netbook The new Pavilion DM1 uses a chip with an integrated high-speed graphics processor that can display HD-quality video without running the battery down too fast. Prices: $900 and $1,000. “Hewlett-Packard on Tuesday announced a netbook with some cutting-edge mobile broadband and graphics technologies that could make […]

ITBusinessEdge: Wi-Fi Is Great But You Still Need Ethernet Wired networks can go greater distances than Wi-Fi, they’re more stable, and power over Ethernet (PoE) lets you place network devices where no AC power is available. “I’ve written a number of blog posts on the use of Wi-Fi in SMBs, which, when correctly deployed, can […]

SMB News From Network World: Do It Yourself Tech Tutorials – The Best Of 2010 Other tutorials linked in this top-ten roundup include: the 25 worst bad habits with technology and how to fix them, how to print on a budget, how to create an iPhone app and 11 hidden security threats and how to […]

PCWorld: First Look – Lok-It Pocket Drive Secure Flash Drive Lok-It doesn’t use encryption so doesn’t meet government security standards, but its hardware-only approach to security does mean it’s not susceptible to some kinds of hacking, and it won’t spook IT managers concerned about any device with software running on it being plugged into their […]

Entrepreneur: How To Protect Your Intellectual Property From registering your business name, to registering with the patent office to defending your registered rights, this article provides a short course on everything to do with property rights, including copyrights, trademarks and patents. “Paul Allen’s recent patent infringement suit against Facebook, Google and other tech giants has […]

PCWorld: Download – MiMedia Online Media Backup Compared to Dropbox, its main competition, MiMedia is a good deal, offering twice the storage capacity for the same fee. But it doesn’t show up as a drive in Windows. “Who needs to back up to an external drive when you can back up to the cloud? MiMedia […]

AllBusiness: Why Your Small Business Doesn’t Need A Server Mackenzie argues that today’s online, cloud-based technology has rendered the concept of on-site servers obsolete – at least for small businesses. “Does your small business currently run its own servers? If you don’t, then resist the temptation. And even if you do, I’d like to suggest […]

PCWorld: Add-ons To Improve Microsoft Office This collection of Office plug-ins includes one that adds tabbed document management, another that makes it easier to find functions in Office’s new (to some) ribbon interface, and another that simulates the old pre-ribbon Office interface. “Anyone who uses Microsoft Office will agree on two things: It’s a powerful […]

ITBusinessEdge: Small Business IT Support: Deciding What’s Important The five nines of uptime – 99.999% availability of systems – that big businesses shoot for is an expensive proposition because it costs more in hardware and support. Most SMBs don’t need it. “I first explored the topic of achieving high system uptime earlier this year in […]

Smallbiztechnology.com: Why You Need A Mobile Website Your customers are surfing the Web on their mobile devices. If they go to your site and can’t navigate easily because it’s not optimized for mobiles, they may not come back. “If you look around you at any conference or on a train, what are people doing? Their […]

Small Business Trends: Website Design Trends To Follow In 2011 Bellamkonda’s top three trends: the need to support multiple browser and device platforms, exploit the potential of HTML5 and new design strategies for grabbing visitors’ attention quickly. “Last year we published the Top Web Design Trends For Small Business in 2010 and as I reflect […]