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You must be thinking that’s an odd thing to say, after all, shouldn’t a company be “inspiring,” “amazing” and all those other superlatives? I don’t disagree, but it all starts with doing everyday things in a less annoying manner.
The fact is that every company has tasks that are bound to annoy either those doing them or their clients. Our goal is to make these interactions more human, and by doing so, hopefully our staff and clients’ days are a bit less stressful. Here are some ways in which we’re less annoying:
Sales Calls:
Even if our product were life-saving, we’d still need to get the word out. IT people are annoyed day in and day out by sales calls and spiels. We can’t escape it, but we can do it differently. We encourage our reps to ditch the script and stand out from the cold-calling zombies. Treat the prospective clients with respect. Sounds simple, right? We live it.
Marketing:
There are plenty of annoying marketing options, but we tend to gravitate towards those that don’t beat our message over your head… we prefer to entertain, educate or at least add some style to our ads where we can.
Accounting:
How annoying is it when a supplier calls you the day before a payable is due? Although credit is important in these times, we’re understanding that checks really do take a few days to mail. By encouraging our AR reps to be less annoying, we get better loyalty from our repeat clients.
We don’t have to count on any one client paying us in order to pay our suppliers. It is pretty annoying to find out a client is unable to pay you because their client hasn’t paid them. Perhaps operating capital or even a credit line should have been taken into account before incorporating?! Sheesh…
Availability:
It’s really annoying to call a company and not be able to get somebody on the phone - in any industry. We do our best to always have cross-trained support staff and backups in place to fulfill our clients needs, even if a particular contact is out of the office.
Responsiveness:
Vibrant has a top-down attitude that we strive to impress with our responsiveness. Clients who are used to the annoying process of waiting days for a quote from a channel partner are always blown away when we get them a quote within an hour or even a few minutes.
These are just a few of the small areas in which we try to stand out. The payback? Customer loyalty, and being genuinely proud of what we are: Less annoying.
So you’re considering buying remarketed IT equipment (servers, routers, storage, etc.) but you’re not quite sure what to watch out for. Buying used IT gear is a great decision for stretching your budget but there are some questions you might want to ask when choosing a vendor so you get top-notch quality equipment and don’t get burned.
1. Are you getting the real deal?
Is the quoted equipment true manufacturer-branded hardware? (Example: Is the memory IBM or some 3rd party knock-off?) This is HUGE when you try to add hardware to existing maintenance agreements. No 3rd party hardware is typically supported. Sometimes dealers will try to slide 3rd party components into system quotes and hope you won’t notice - or worse yet, they won’t even mention it. Be sure to ask.
2. Who exactly are you dealing with?
Is the outfit you’re buying from a legit company? Check their website, Google the company name, ask for references, referrals and current customers. You might even do a map search of their address just to see if they’re in an office building (and not some random residential address).
3. Is there a warranty?
What happens if the products show up and don’t work, or cause system errors? Can someone troubleshoot it? Is there tech support? Who do you call? How fast can the problem be solved? A solid warranty as well as a strong technical staff are great indicators of a company that is proud to stand behind its products.
4. Supplier or Broker?
Do they have complete knowledge of the products or are they just buying from other dealers, and don’t own it? Anyone can sell parts, just check eBay. But you will want a company who will warranty products and guarantee work done. These companies own large inventories of products and quality check everything in their own technical labs. Shipments will arrive quicker, cheaper and with greater peace of mind from stocking vendors.
5. Too Good to be True?
If it seems too good to be true, it often is. When offered unbelievable low prices, something is being sacrificed. Is it quality? Authenticity? Be sure to find out and get it in writing (something to the effect of “the following product is in perfect working condition and guaranteed to be IBM original”). There are some great deals on refurbished and used equipment, but sometimes these truly are too good to be true.
Michelle Clough is an account executive at Vibrant Technologies working with clients from various industries and has over 10 years experienced in the remarketed IT industry. Contact her with further questions or if you have IT equipment to buy or sell.
Two weeks ago, two of our best techs, Erick and Kris, informed me that Slashdot’s 10th Anniversary was upon us and that we had to host a regional anniversary party for them. Of course I agreed, because all of the following are awesome: Erick and Kris, Slashdot, Slashdotters and Parties.
I reeled in approval from the top to throw some money at this and put the techs in charge of planning and organizing. Last night we had the party here and I think the results were pretty great.
(Lindsi rolled all the photos and videos into a great montage.)
So, what does a Slashdot crowd consider fun and entertaining?
1) Smashing old EMC, Sun, HP, IBM, Cisco and Brocade gear with a sledgehammer, while offering up witty commentary.
2) Playing Guitar Hero and old video games on large projector screens.
3) Mingling with like-minded techie-types and gamers that are proud to be geeks.
4) LOLcats (which were on the drink tickets, walls, cake and who knows what else).
5) Geek Facepainting (OK, the idea of that was funnier than in reality. Only two people got logos painted on their face, Slashdot and Apple, but we were ready to also do Firefox, Tux and Redhat logos).
6) Hot Taco bars, beers and mixed drinks (who doesn’t?)
7) Singing Happy Birthday to a website (my wife really laughed at me for that one).
Thanks to all who came, we had a blast and loved meeting everybody.
Spaghetti Cabling that would make a fully-grown sys admin cry.
or… Cable management is for wimps.
Most network and system administrators like a nice tidy cabled cabinet of servers and network equipment. Sometimes it just doesn’t work out that way. The following are some of my favorite images of nasty cable messes.
===================
A Cable Mess of Beauty
photo by: Cormac Phelan
===================
======================== Racks and Racks of Spaghetti
photo by: Andrew McKaskill
========================
================ Cable-Bound Racks
photo by: dM.nyc
================
========================================= Good Old-Fashioned Telephone Wire Mess in Bangkok
photo by: Nurmi
=========================================
==================== Cable Mess (un)Managed
photo by: gruzuk
====================
================================ The Spaghetti Man on Sixth Avenue, NYC
photo by: Ken
================================
==================================== Spaghetti Cables on the CMS Tracker at CERN
photo by: Richard Brauer
====================================
================== Colorful Cable Salad
photo by: Zenji
==================
================== A Fine Mess
photo by: BRphoto
==================
==================== Cable Mess Frustration
photo by: Jonathan Arehart
====================
================== Rat’s Nest Cable Mess
photo by: n8foo
==================
============================== Sound Stage Cables get messed up too
photo by: Laura A Watt
==============================
============== Cable Chaos
photo by: VespaGT
==============
==============================================
LOPSA’s Sys Admin Horrors
LOPSA (League of Professional System Administrators) is a terrific organization that Vibrant wholeheartedly supports. Afterall, they host National SysAdmin Appreciation Day and also came up with a terrific photo set of Sys Admin horrors including the cable messes below:
=============================
DO NOT TOUCH ANY OF THESE WIRES! =============================
Robert Davie, Founder of Venderis was gracious enough to answer a few of our questions regarding his revolutionary new End of Life IT Asset Recovery software solution, Venderis Software Solution Suite.
“Armored trucks, employee background checks, the issues that relate to sending systems off-site are all eliminated by our solution.”
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In a nutshell, what does Venderis do?
“I need more than a nutshell to describe Venderis… but here goes. Venderis has sort of a dual role. It reduces the risk of data stored on PCs from escaping to the public domain, while at the same time it increases the resale value of PC assets.
Venderis accomplishes this dual role in several ways:
1. By erasing hard drives
2. By restoring the original Operating System
3. By running diagnostics important to the resale community
4. By discovering and auditing the level of hardware details necessary for resale
And probably most importantly, Venderis performs its functions across a WAN, LAN or enterprise network thereby making these end-of-life processes automated, fast and easy.”
How did you come up with the idea for Venderis?
“There is an interesting story behind this. Three of us went away to the North Carolina coast to brainstorm and discuss a several ideas for processes that occur at the end of the life of PCs. Utilizing my experience in the used computer industry, taking advantage of an employee’s strengths, and adding the objective viewpoints of a Harvard MBA, we set off to the beach for a brainstorm session.
After using an entire roll of whiteboard paper, a complete set of magic markers, and exhausting our brains, we came up with five problem areas that needed desperate attention, and that could be automated through software application.”
What is your background in the IT industry?
“I have been in the IT asset remarketing industry since I graduated from college, with the exception of a short stint of three years at IBM, almost 20 years altogether. As the founder of ITParade.com, I was responsible for creating a large marketplace for buyers and sellers of used computer and networking systems.
Over 1500 computer resellers participate in the ITParade.com marketplace and my interaction with them generated unique insights into the inner-workings of the industry that allowed me to launch Venderis.”
Who can benefit from using the Venderis Asset Recovery Software Solution?
“Fortune 5000 companies, large organizations, IT Asset Remarketers, Recovery Specialists. Anyone who is concerned about cutting costs at the end of life of an IT asset. Anyone who is concerned about chain of custody of sensitive data contained within hard drives. Anyone who needs to maximize the resale value of PC assets.”
What is your current go-to-market plan?
“We intend to leverage our network of over 1500 IT resellers developed over a 10-year period at ITParade.com. These relationships represent the leading resellers in the United States and around the world. Venderis will support an initial group of 12 leading resellers, then a larger group of resellers, through an extensive and comprehensive marketing and support system that includes marketing materials, co-selling, Live Support, On-site Training, On-site Support and Webinars.”
Security is a hot-button issue in the asset recovery world, does Venderis help address these concerns?
“Security is an extremely important issue. It was one of the driving factors in the development of Venderis.
Venderis can guarantee that sensitive data stays within an organization by providing the ability to wipe 10 or 10,000 systems on-site and simultaneously. The chain of custody stays with the end user of Venderis, no third-party erasure is required and therefore absolute safety of sensitive data is guaranteed! Armored trucks, employee background checks, the issues that relate to sending systems off-site are all eliminated by our solution.
Finally, there is no limit to the number of Department of Defense-standard erasures Venderis can perform.”
———————————————————————————
Vibrant is proud to be a tier1 reseller of Venderis. We’ll be working the Venderis booth along with Robert at the upcoming E-Scrap IT Asset Recovery Conference where they are a sponsor. If you’re in the Asset Recovery business, please stop by our booth and introduce yourself, meet Robert and learn more about how Venderis can benefit you and your clients.
The Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal’s 9th annual “Best Places to Work” publication came out on Friday, and Vibrant ranked in the top 20 small businesses. It’s a great honor to work for a company that is even considered, and especially for one of the winners.
I love working for Vibrant - and I’m quick to share stories about my time here with friends or family. The “perks” of working for an edgy, innovative company range from Video Game Happy Hours to themed summer and holiday parties - but while those events provide occasional entertainment, the fun part is the bonding that takes place between employees.
It’s true when they say a work environment depends heavily on the people in it. Each person at Vibrant is passionate about what they (we) do (and who we’re doing it with), and I believe that’s what makes us one of the best places to work.
The Playstation Blog has drawn the curtain strings a salivating tad to show off their very impressive server cluster of rackmounted PS3s that run it’s multi-player game Warhawk.
The powerful processor is no stranger to the data center, as it is also being used in IBM System X blade servers and System Z mainframes.
Players of Warhawk on Playstation 3s take advantage of a server method they call IGS or “Integrated Game Server”, which is essentially distributed computing. This allows players to take advantage of PS3s nearby to reduce latency, but Sony also wanted to have dedicated racks of PS3s available to gamers as well.
It is this type of innovation potential which made us choose the PS3 as one of the ten servers that changed the world last year and it’s beginning to fulfill the prophecy, at least in the gaming world.
I would love to get my hands on one of these rackmount kits and rig a PS3 into one of our server racks for our next in-house video game happy hour.
OK, maybe not quite yet… but Pandia Search Engine News is reporting that Google runs more than 1 million servers.
Pandia cites a Gartner analyst from the fair elven lands of Norway (the article is in Norwegian, so we’ll have to take their word for it).
Google reports that it spends some 200 to 250 million US dollars a year on IT equipment. We know that Google make use of a large number of cheap off the shelf servers using open source (and free) LINUX.
If we say that Google spends 900 USD on each machine, and the same sum on storage and peripherals, it is a fair guess that Google uses some 1 million servers in its data centers.
———————————————————————————-
Pandia goes on to speculate that Google likely installs 100,000 new servers per quarter in datacenters around the world. That would place Google as the 4th largest server producer in the world after HP, Dell and IBM.
But does Google really have 1 million servers? I’m not so sure. The logic above is fuzzy at best and others have estimated they only have 450,000 systems. My guess is reality falls somewhere in between these impressive numbers.
I wonder how many servers are purely dedicated to facilitating searches for LOLcats?
We know that Google primarily uses white box linux-based server models and blade servers, but should they ever need memory or CPU upgrades, Vibrant sells a wide range of Used Servers. Our sales reps hear “1 million servers” and can’t help but drool.
Nat is ranting about firms who exhibited at the OSCON Open Source Convention this year who probably didn’t fit in. Nonetheless, is the clear definition of open source deteriorating? Is “Open Source” more of a way of thinking than a rigid software term? Let’s pretend for a minute it is, and explain how Vibrant’s line of used servers could be considered open source.
We don’t care what OS you load onto it once you’ve gotten it… Linux, Windows, AIX, Solaris, go for it!
Furthermore, we don’t care which manufacturer you want to buy, we carry Sun, HP, IBM and Dell. If you want to add 3rd party drives or memory, we’ll do that too!
Finally, we don’t lock anybody into set server configurations. Instead, we’ll custom configure a system to meet their needs.
——————————————————————————
OK, so can we respectfully call our used server products “open source”?
Nah! It just doesn’t feel right to use the term when it comes to hardware.
(But we will custom paint a server if you prefer your Big Blue IBM server in orange. That has to count for something, right!?)
Today, 07/07/07, the winners of a popular vote to become the new world wonders will be revealed. Naturally, we’ve also offered our personal picks for the Seven Wonders of the World - Tech Edition. Let the debates begin.
Google has rapidly become a permanent cornerstone in the technology world, so it’s an obvious first stop on our tour of the Seven Tech Wonders. The building now known as the Googleplex was originally occupied by Silicon Graphics, Inc. and purchased by Google in June of 2006.
Creativity was clearly a priority after Google took over - no expense was spared in designing the luxurious environment. The Google headquarters boasts two swimming pools, gourmet restaurants, game rooms, free laundry and salons complete with a masseuse - definitely not your average American office building. And leave it to Google to over-accommodate their creative people: the amenities are all available 24/7, because the best ideas don’t always come between 9 and 5.
Check out photos on Flickr, Time’s pictorial or Fortune’s video tour. Maybe even run it past your CEO next time he or she is brainstorming employee incentive programs.
Industrial Light and Magic’s datacenter is a wonder of the world in any category. Datacenters can be big, they can be expensive, they can be complicated, and then they can be ILM. The ILM facility spans 13,500 square feet with more than 600 miles of network cables; a 3000 processor server farm (expands to 5000 after hours from desktop computers); and about 170 terabytes of storage - all bound together by a 340-node, 10 GB backbone. (For those who may not understand just how big and how fast that actually is: the entire internet doesn’t even run at that speed.)
The need for all this data comes from the digital effects of such films as Transformers, Star Wars and Pirates of the Caribbean. Since creating the first fully computer-generated sequence for a movie in Star Trek II, ILM has been on the bleeding edge of digital effects, and the profits from these movies are vital contributors to datacenter upgrades.
Here’s a thought to wrap your brain around: if you’re downloading movies or music on a T1 line (likely the speed of the connection at your office) 24 hours a day, it would take about 25 years to download ILM’s 150+ terabytes. (Thanks Michael!!)
——————————————————————————-
Next stop on the Tech Wonder tour: the International Space Station. If you look out of the left side of the bus, and maybe slightly upward, you will see the ISS: the stuff Sci-Fi movies are made of. The model for the station had been in the concept stages since the early 80’s and was finally put into orbit in 1998.
The ISS recently made the news with what could have become disastrous: computer failure resulted in losing thruster and environmental controls. After less than one day of being inoperative, the computers were brought back online and full control was restored. A power surge from the newly installed solar arrays is believed to have been the major contributor to the failure.
The future is uncertain for the ISS, however there are plans for future missions as far out as 2010. The ISS has been considered a pit stop for missions to the moon and even Mars. And according to NASA, July 9, 2007 will bring an announcement of a new mission to Mars.
As our tour bus makes its descent back to planet Earth, you’ll notice a bright white light glowing from a glass cube in Manhattan, New York. It’s the first Apple store to stay open 24/7, and is easily one of the most remarkable sites the retail tech world - especially when compared to the measly garage where Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak built the first Apple computer. The grand opening of the underground concept store was hyped by Apple enthusiasts worldwide, and drew thousands of gawkers on opening day. The store is easily the most visual representation of Apple’s modern, clean design experience. Take a virtual tour of the Manhattan store to experience it for yourself.
(Side note: The garage where the first HP computer was built was just recognized as a national landmark. While HP’s inventions changed the business world, the idea of creating a PC for the average user is possibly a more groundbreaking feat, and the impact more profound. How many of us remember playing Oregon Trail or Montezuma’s Revenge on our elementary school’s Apple II? Personally, I loved Captain Goodnight!)
Next stop: Vegas. The Viva Vision canopy is one of the flashiest examples of technology you’ll see. Twelve million LED’s light up 1400 feet of canopy with 220 speakers producing 550,000 watts of sound providing the music for each show. The previous setup for this light show was controlled by 32 separate computers located in various kiosks along the street. Since the upgrade in 2004, now only 10 computers control the show from a central control room.
Far away from the bright lights of Vegas, orbiting the earth at five miles per second, this marvel of astronomy explores the deepest corners of space. From Hubblesite.org:
The Hubble Space Telescope’s launch in 1990 sped humanity to one of its greatest advances in that journey… Its position above the atmosphere, which distorts and blocks the light that reaches our planet, gives it a view of the universe that typically far surpasses that of ground-based telescopes.
Hubble is one of NASA’s most successful and long-lasting science missions. It has beamed hundreds of thousands of images back to Earth, shedding light on many of the great mysteries of astronomy. Its gaze has helped determine the age of the universe, the identity of quasars, and the existence of dark energy.
This final stop is probably the least well-known tech wonder. The monument was dedicated in 1990 and sits on the grounds of the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. It consists of four encrypted messages, three of which have been solved, initially by hand and then by a Pentium II computer.
The final message requires clues other than the cipher on the monument. The messages probably won’t make sense until the final code is solved, when it is, the mystery to life will be revealed! Then someone will just come up with another complicated, seemingly-uncrackable code.
——————————————————————————-
Which wonders did we miss? What’s your favorite wonder?
Please drop us a line or leave a comment below.
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So you’re considering buying remarketed IT equipment (servers, routers, storage, etc.) but you’re not quite sure what to watch out for. Buying used IT gear is a great decision for stretching your budget but there are some questions you might want to ask when choosing a vendor so you get top-notch quality equipment and don’t get burned.
supports. Afterall, they host National 
Robert Davie, Founder of 
OK, maybe not quite yet… but Pandia Search Engine News 
Google has rapidly become a permanent cornerstone in the technology world, so it’s an obvious first stop on our tour of the Seven Tech Wonders. The building now known as the Googleplex was originally occupied by Silicon Graphics, Inc. and purchased by Google in June of 2006.
This final stop is probably the least well-known tech wonder. The monument was dedicated in 1990 and sits on the grounds of the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. It consists of four encrypted messages, three of which have been solved, initially by hand and then by a Pentium II computer.