Hardware As A Service (HaaS) & Printers

Hardware as a Service (HaaS) is growing in popularity throughout IT and across virtually all connected devices. Cloud and grid computing is driving much of this increased interest and demand. HaaS has even been expanding out to desktop computing to users, as well. But what about print and copy?

Amerx has worked to develop a HaaS solution to extend from production level servers all the way down to the output level for printers and MFPs. This change helps our clients drive traditionally high capital expenditures off the balance sheet, and place them where they belong as accurate, measurable operating expenditures.

This method of hardware acquisition improves the experience for administrative staff and for end users alike.

In practical application, the procurement process is similar to licensing. Generally speaking, we remotely monitor and support hardware on a client’s site on a subscription basis, which provides an equal or even superior support experience to what clients have grown accustom.

If you are interested in learning more about Hardware as a Service or just have questions about your printer and MFP fleet, contact Amerx today for a free review – you’ll be surprised what we can tell you.

Cloud Computing Matures In Certains Areas

As cloud computing continues to gain momentum, popularity and features, there are areas that are maturing more rapidly than others. Take a minute to review this article from Network Computing for more details around storage and the cloud:

Cloud storage suppliers are the arms merchants for cloud storage. These are the guys that provide the equipment that cloud storage providers use to store user data. This layer of cloud storage, similar to Cloud Providers and Cloud ISVs, has also matured quite a bit in the last year.

First, there is a better understanding of what it takes to be a cloud storage supplier. Just because a vendor makes a RAID array does not mean they have a cloud storage offering. At their core, systems that cloud storage suppliers provide need to be cost effective and massively scalable. There are traditional systems that meet that requirement, of course, but that does not make them cloud storage. What does is when these systems are coupled with cloud storage software that delivers the multi-tenant cloud functions that providers need to manage multiple users and organizations. In most cases, this also includes a REST API set that allows the ISVs to control specifically how data is transferred and stored on the system. Probably the biggest development on the supplier side is the availability of cloud enablement software that provide cloud-like services that traditional manufacturers can add to their systems.

Most systems today offer some sort of scale-out capability where performance and capacity can be incrementally increased by adding another storage component or node. There is an interesting debate around how these nodes should intercommunicate. A global file system, for example, will allow multiple NAS heads to be treated as one from a file storage perspective but it will not, typically, allow for all those NAS heads to be administered as one. Global file systems do provide more flexibility around node selection. A more grid-like architecture does not provide as much flexibility in node selection but does provide a single file system and a single point of management. Other systems have added location independence to their scale out capabilities. In other words, all the nodes of a cluster do not need to be in the same physical location.

There are other capabilities that may or may not be important to the provider and users of this storage infrastructure. One is global positioning of data. This is more than just replicating data for a disaster recovery standpoint. The goal is to move data as close to the consumers of that data as possible. Another capability that ties into this is the ability to make multiple copies of a popular dataset on multiple nodes geographically dispersed around the world or country.

Cloud storage suppliers are often thought of as NAS only systems, where performance plays second fiddle to capacity and scale. Performance should not be overlooked, especially in cloud compute environments. In these environments, the users are remote, but the data is not. Companies providing cloud compute have the biggest challenge in that not only do they need capacity and scale, they also need performance with the same competitive price as cloud storage providers. Even though most users never see it or even know who made it, the actual hardware and software that cloud providers use does make a difference and does impact them directly. The selection of the right hardware and software allows the provider to keep prices low and service high. Most importantly it can keep them in business.

What do you think? Do you agree? What’s the next big step for cloud computing? Please share your thoughts.

Demand IT Standards For All

How standards compliant are the products and services in your organization? Do your appliances and devices play well together? Are strong standards even part of your process? Learn why they are important and should be below:

In technology, there is lots of talk about the need for standards for this or that technology. I am an unabashed proponent of standards. There are lots of very smart people who work on standards either as part of their job or on their own time. The standards get pushed through the working groups, are ratified by the standards bodies, and are published to the world. Then those people move on to other things while vendors scramble to implement the standards in their products and update their data sheets.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that products will interoperate, right? If you have been in IT for any length of time, you’ve witnessed the finger-pointing among vendors about how a competitor’s product doesn’t conform to the standards while theirs does. In many cases, both vendors are right and wrong.

Any useful standard is likely to be pretty complex. I know that the people who staff the standards bodies work diligently on developing standards and nailing down minutiae, but there is no way to predict all of the possible interpretations of the standards documents. Often times, the confusion is over little things like field interpretations or process flows, and depending on how you read it, you can implement the standard in different, but valid, way.

How does this get resolved? One way is with plug fests. Getting the implementers and engineers in a room where they hook up gear and see what works and what doesn’t. Then they ferret out the root cause and figure out the best way to resolve the problem. If all goes well, these problems get resolved and everyone agrees to the same interpretation of the standards and that gets fed back into the product development process. That’s what is supposed to happen, at least, but it doesn’t always. There were plug fests for IPSec testing, but trying to get vendor A’s product to talk to Vendor B’s product (I was doing this way back in 98 when IPSec was all the rage) was an impossible task unless the vendors did specific interoperation work outside of the plugfests.

We were destined for the same outcome with Wi-Fi, where various vendors would interpret 802.11 specs differently and the products from different vendors wouldn’t work together. Until the Wi-Fi Alliance was created to perform interoperability testing and a logo program demonstrating significant, functional, interoperation. The Wi-Fi alliance didn’t create standards, they just became the defacto interpretation of the standards. The resulting interoperation between vendors demonstrated through the Wi-Fi Alliance logo program is what allowed Wi-Fi to grow astronomically.

The same can be said of the Metro Ethernet Forum that brings together all the relevant stakeholders like carriers and vendors, taking the work from the IEEE and providing a uniform interpretation of the standards so that interoperability can take place. Without the work of the MEF, standardization would likely have taken place anyway, since the carriers tend to have dual-source equipment policies and would thus force interoperation, but the MEF moved things along and smoothed the process.

As vendors and IT march along to converged networking, we need to ensure that our next generation networks are going to be interoperable in meaningful ways. Primarily in the area of supporting the protocols and standards for Data Center Bridging (DCB). Granted, the standards are still moving through the task groups and working groups in the IEEE and IETF, so it may be too early to expect interoperable products, but process-like plug fests and other conformance testing needs to be at the forefront of everyone’s mind. You, the IT buyer, need to be telling your vendors loud and clear that you want demonstrably interoperable products. In fact, interoperable products should be a requirement.

I have said this before. If you don’t make the demands of your vendors, and if you don’t make interoperable standards a requirement for your equipment purchases, then you can expect to see an environment around FCoE much like we see with Fibre Channel today: qualified equipment lists that limit you to approved products only. Violation of support contracts if you go off the reservation. And of course, long term lock-in.

[Souce: Network Computing]

Print From The Cloud

Traditional printing is an encumbrance for increasingly mobile customers. In contrast, ePrint should enable laptop, netbook, smartphone and tablet users to further slip the physical constraints of home and office, and take their business and play further on up the road. Most importantly, though, “print-enabling” mobile computing could broaden users’ views of the processes for which cloud computing is capable and appropriate.

Here’s what HP (NYSE: HPQ) says its new Web-enabled ePrint all-in-one printers will allow people to do:

• print from any email-enabled device;
• print documents or files stored in the “Google Cloud” and similar environments without a local proxy PC or Web appliance;
• transform printers into “publishing platforms” enhanced with customized apps; and
• schedule timed printing of specific content, such as daily news feeds and after-school activities materials.

The new devices will support Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Office documents, Adobe (Nasdaq: ADBE) PDFs and JPEG image files, among others, and ePrint apps will be available from vendors such as Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO), msnbc.com, Facebook, Live Nation, Crayola, Reuters, DocStoc and Picasa Web Albums.

In addition, HP and partners, including Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), Box.net, Reuters, Portfolio.com, Daily Brief, DocStoc and Biztree, will begin offering printing apps and services tailored for business customers. Finally, HP said ePrint devices will support digital print advertising mixed with free content.

Sounds interesting, but does ePrint really qualify as the “new category” of printers that HP claims? Yes and no.

More Mobility

On the plus side, ePrint’s enabling technology — each ePrint machine has a simple, unique email address — is an elegant solution to a problem that has been increasingly painful for some mobile users, especially owners of popular devices with few or no printing options, such as Apple’s (Nasdaq: AAPL) iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. HP ePrint should make printing easy and seamless for those folks and potentially lower adoption barriers for mobile products.

Some might say that ePrint is primarily a commercial ploy meant to 1) continue the seemingly endless demand for HP toner and ink, 2) ensure the health of HP’s printing and Imaging group — its most profitable division, and 3) modernize one of HP’s key business and product strategies. Maximizing revenues is close to every vendor’s heart and has been emblematic of HP CEO Mark Hurd’s management efforts. However, ePrint demonstrates how a vendor can have its profits and modernization, too.

Mobility is causing tectonic shifts across the high-tech landscape, allowing users to capture, consume and create information anywhere, anytime, and in any circumstance. That said, despite the aerobatic future HP and others envision for data, ePrint highlights the simple fact that many documents and images still (and probably always will) require physical manifestation. Thus, ePrint arrives at a pivotal moment, as processes, documents and services once confined to traditional desktop PCs become increasingly untethered, potentially achieving lift-off to the cloud.

The simplicity of ePrint will likely help make the new machines a success, but lacking such a solution could have put HP at serious risk. Traditional printing is an encumbrance for increasingly mobile customers. In contrast, ePrint should enable laptop, netbook, smartphone and tablet users to further slip the physical constraints of home and office, and take their business and play further on up the road. Most importantly, though, “print-enabling” mobile computing could broaden users’ views of the processes for which cloud computing is capable and appropriate.

Platform-Agnostic Printing

ePrint’s Web-enabling features also spell the effective end to system-restrained printing. So long as a device has Web access, HP’s ePrint all-in-ones couldn’t care less if documents come from Windows-, Mac- or Linux-based computers, whether they’re running compatible drivers or even whether they’re new or old. Yet that also casts light on members of HP’s ePrint partner roster, particularly Google.

The Google “seal of approval” could prove beneficial for HP sales, and ePrint’s capabilities may pique the interest of those considering Google Docs for business use. Still, the notable absences of Microsoft and Apple from HP’s buddy list makes one wonder whether they consider ePrint’s platform agnosticism contradictory to their own cloud and product plans. Also uncertain is just how well some of HP’s proposed ePrint partnerships will work out, especially those looking to trade free content for printed advertisements.

Overall, HP’s ePrint qualifies as an elegant and innovative solution to a growing if not especially severe problem. The new printers should make life easier for consumers and could also have a potentially huge impact on mobile jobs and business processes. That should place HP in good stead with its own customers, tempt users of other printer brands and put competitors in a sweat to develop Web/cloud-enabled solutions of their own.

[Souce: eCommerceTimes]

What do you think… is the new ePrint solution necessary? Will you use the flexibility HP claims is there? Tell us with your comments below.

Is Document Management Important?

The following research and statistics may sound unbelievable, but if the facts are even remotely close to those provided below, we should all be certain to process, implement, train and manage our workflows correctly.

Take a look:

A lack of clear guidelines on document retention causes over half of office workers to save documents on the system, never to be found again. The survey of office employees was carried out by NetworkedPlanet, a provider of enterprise search solutions, into the search and retrieval of documents.

Of the people surveyed, 52% admitted to saving a document onto the company intranet/network and never finding it again, with 39% citing a lack of guidelines being in place to advise how files should be saved. This highlights that time is being wasted unnecessarily as many people just don’t know where to start when looking for documents saved by either themselves or colleagues.

The problem is that many enterprise search tools don’t offer an efficient way to search the large amounts of data stored on a corporate system. In most cases it is down to the individual where information is saved, meaning that it can be difficult for someone else to find, if they thought it should have been stored somewhere else,” comments Kal Ahmed, director at NetworkedPlanet.

“Increasingly, people want to search for specific files based around the concepts and ideas related to them. All of this means that looking for data on an intranet does not reflect the way people think and as a result may create inefficiencies within a business,” he adds. [Source:ITRPortal]

Do these finding apply to your organization? Losing documents is costly, but what about the documents that are printed in error too? We’ll discuss that in the future with more to come.

A Couple Risks To Reduce

The IT and operations juggling act can work, for a while, but it has its disadvantages where task, assignments, and responsibilities can get dropped. Print, while generally considered a passive business activity, it is quite critical to business as usual operations.

Here are a couple key areas of value that your IT staff or a qualified managed print services provider should deliver:

Enhanced information security.
Networked printers and MFPs pose the same security risks as any networked device. A managed print service can include SLAs for providing both device and document security. This may include encryption of data on a device’s hard drive, as well as smart card authentication or “follow-me” printing that holds print jobs until a user authenticates at the device.

While this can be achieved without MPS, an external provider can help implement policies and
business rules that can enforce and audit secure printing policies.

Business continuity.
Printing is critical to many business processes, and for mid-sized organizations the threat of down time can arguably be more severe than for the large organizations, as they frequently do not have the spare capacity to cope with problems, or have the time and skills to preempt them. By using a managed service provider to monitor and manage the print environment, the midmarket organization can mitigate the risk of downtime and pre-empt potential problems, rather than trying to fire fight when they ́ve already happened.

Add Value Back To The IT Department

Whether your IT staff is 1 or many, printers and copiers are likely part of their responsibility. If your talented IT staff is anything like the typical team, they probably don’t value support tickets for printer jams and toner low warnings.

What if you could give life back to your over-worked, challenge-ridden IT experts? Outsourcing to managed print services experts is one great way to:

Free up IT staff.
Small to medium businesses are limited by the lack of IT staff with specific printing expertise. Without the in-house skills, businesses are finding it challenging to support printers that are increasing in sophistication. By adopting an MPS contract that includes service and support, many of the mundane tasks of printer management can be managed by a third party, which can free up IT staff to focus on addressing other issues, resulting in greater productivity for the IT department.

Increased user productivity.
Less user intervention and minimal device downtime through proactive supplies replenishment and assured service delivery means fewer business disruptions. Midmarket print services that offer remote monitoring enable device and supply usage to be monitored, freeing up dependency on IT resources. This can be particularly useful for the high proportion of midmarket businesses that have multiple locations and branch offices. Branch locations typically have few or no IT skills at their site and require remote assistance to support printing equipment.

Smart printing practices.
Efficient device utilization means the right print jobs are sent to the most cost-effective printers, and colour documents are printed only when needed. The use of document workflow solutions and MFPs means that scan-to-email or scan-to-file features can be used to minimize unnecessary printing.

If any of this sounds promising, then you are likely a strong candidate for adding value back to IT, and a candidate for effective change management in your organization.

Managing Printer & MFP Fleet Costs

There are so many ways to reduce costs in your business – some are easy to identify and implement, most are not. And you have likely eliminated most of these “profitability boosters” in the past 24 months in an effort to combat the “Great Recession”.

But what if there was one shiny, silver bullet left to wield? There is if you haven’t considered managed print services, and here’s why:

Lower costs.
Both basic and full MPS offer predictable pricing based on monthly cost-per-page contracts. Remote monitoring of the printer fleet ensures just-in-time delivery of supplies and reliable break/fix service delivery, meaning that businesses do not need to tie up capital in stocking consumables that may never get used if a printer goes out of service, and time is not wasted searching for a wide range of different consumables.

Simplified procurement and budgeting.
Using an MPS contract reduces manual procurement processes and simplifies invoicing through consolidated billing. With few organisations using a single printer or copier brand, the most effective service is one that covers all devices in the print environment.

Device consolidation.
Managing fewer devices and fewer service contracts means easier tracking and less administrative work. Single function devices can be replaced with MFPs, which require fewer consumables, reducing total cost of ownership, storage requirements and service interruptions. Money saved from device consolidation and effective print management can be devoted to other areas of the business.

Improved energy efficiency.
Sustainable IT has become an area of concern for businesses of all sizes. By consolidating a multitude of printers, copiers, fax machines and scanners to fewer MFP platforms, businesses can realise energy savings through reduced power consumption. Smarter printing practices such as duplex printing, colour access controls and pull-printing, which releases print jobs on user authentication, can also minimise the amount of wasteful printing and so further lowering energy usage.

The cost savings looming in your bloated, under-managed printer fleet is substantial… and it is probably as good a time as any to review your situation and make changes. Your CFO will thank you.

HP Printers & Your Data Security

You may have new questions regarding your data security with respect to your printers and MFPs… see if your questions are the same as some of our customers’ questions.

I saw a recent segment on CBS Evening News that highlighted security issues with copier hard drives. Do MFPs and printers from HP have this same issue?
No. MFPs and printers from HP are not part of this issue. MFPs and printers from HP do not automatically retain images of every document printed, copied, scanned, or emailed by the device. There is no feature or setting in HP printers and MFPs to automatically retain standard print and scan jobs permanently on the hard drive. The exception is Stored incoming Faxes, which temporarily store incoming faxes until released by the user, and are then automatically erased.

How do I protect myself from more sophisticated, forensic recovery of data bits that might be left on the hard drive after standard processing?
All HP MFPS and printers that have hard drives come standard with the “Secure Storage Erase” feature, which performs a secure erase of data on the hard drive. Additionally, the HP High-Performance Secure Hard Disk solution ensures data sent to the drive is encrypted. This practice is part of HP’s Security Best Practices Checklist.

Is it possible to store information on the hard drive if I choose to?
Documents can be stored on the device hard drive intentionally by customers when using the “Stored Jobs” feature. The system can be configured to automatically delete these jobs at 1 hour, 4-hour, 1 day, or 1 week intervals. These jobs include Stored Jobs, Personal Jobs, Quick Copy Jobs, and Proof & Hold Jobs.

Is it possible to securely remove information that has been erased from the hard drive?
The “Secure File Erase” feature ensures any hard drive information from print, copy, fax, and scan jobs is securely removed. When this data is deleted, the hard drive areas containing customer information are overwritten*, ensuring that the information cannot be recovered using diagnostic tools.
Is it possible to protect information I want to store on the hard drive from inappropriate copying or distribution?
Stored data can be protected using encryption. The HP High-Performance Secure Hard Disk solution protects data using encryption. All data written to the HP High-Performance Secure Hard Disk is encrypted; if the hard drive is removed from the system, the encrypted information on the drive is not readable. Stored and Personal jobs can be configured with a PIN by the user to protect others from printing them at the device control panel.

What happens to devices I return to HP at the end of an HPFS lease or Managed Print Services (MPS) contract?
HP understands customer hard drives may contain sensitive business or technological information and employs appropriate security measures using standard industrial practices to safeguard that information.

For hard drives returned to HP, the following procedures are followed.

* Functional hard drives are wiped with a destructive data pattern to all addressable locations.
* Non-functional drives are recycled by crushing at a metal separation plant.

For non-functional hard drives, HP offers a “Defective Media Retention” Carepack. This service allows customers to maintain possession of failed drives while reviewing terms and conditions of standard warranty agreements. See www.hp.com/go/carepack or your HP sales representative for more information.

Customers can securely delete all personal information on the hard drive before disposal, redeployment or end of lease return. By using the “Secure Storage Erase” feature all customer data on the hard drive is overwritten, ensuring the data is securely erased.

When using the “HP High-Performance Secure Hard Disk” solution, all data present on the drive can be deleted by using “Secure Hard Disk Erase/Unlock”, which performs a cryptographic erase. This feature of encrypted storage devices renders all data permanently unreadable by resetting the internal encryption keys.
*Complies with 1) NIST Special Publication 800-88,Guidelines for Media Sanitization (current standard); 2) US Department of Defense 5220.22-M National Industrial Security Program Operating Manual (1997 edition)

All all manufacturers’ security the same as HP’s, you ask… not necessarily, so if you have these or other questions about your printer and MFP fleet devices to help make your workplace a more secure environment, please contact Amerx call at (512) 836-4225.

Printer Costs Management Challenges

What’s so hard about enterprise print and printer fleet management? You acquire a new printer, network it, and install any necessary drivers, and print… easy. Well, the truth is, it isn’t easy, and you can’t just set it and forget it.

Here are a few points to consider why businesses can struggle to keep on top of print costs:

+ Fragmented approach to purchasing. There are two ways of purchasing printing devices. Firstly, devices may be purchased outright using capital expenditure, requiring upfront cash and depreciation over a period of time. Consumables are often bought on an ad-hoc basis, from a variety Printer availability of suppliers – stationery stores, IT resellers or from the vendor direct. The manual process of ordering consumables can be time consuming, hindering productivity and making it almost impossible to keep this approach, a cost-per-page contract includes supplies, service and, in some cases, help-desk support. Disparate purchasing processes mean that few organizations have a clear picture of overall print costs.

+ Device sprawl. The haphazard approach to printer purchasing often results in a patchwork of old equipment and technologies, requiring storage of different supplies, multiple maintenance or no contracts, keeping drivers up to date and increasingly hard to service help desk demands. As well as the inherent costs in managing a mixed fleet of devices, this also impacts user and IT staff productivity and ultimately business continuity.

+ Ratio of printers to users. Businesses may often have far more printers than they need, often driven by fragmented purchasing of desktop and workgroup printers. Some businesses (such as media companies) may operate device-to-user ratios as high as one for every three users, but many would operate more efficiently with a more balanced deployment of devices that may, for instance, share one device between 10 users. The more printers a business has, the greater the costs for supplies, maintenance, support and management. By eliminating desktop printers and centralizing workgroup printers, device ratios can be optimized, increasing productivity and reducing operating costs.

+ Aging printer fleet. Many businesses are operating aging printer fleets over 5 years old. The older a printer, the more likely it is to break down, leading to higher service and maintenance kit costs and reduced productivity. Older printers are less efficient and also often have higher supplies costs, which increases the cost per page for printing. Replacing outdated printers with more efficient printers or MFPs can significantly reduce costs and lower energy usage. Older equipment is also less likely to be compatible with the latest document workflow solutions that can offer further benefits in terms of reducing paper usage and enhancing document security.

+Lack of print management tools. Few organizations have the software tools to enable them to track, monitor, audit and control their print environment to reduce waste, optimize performance, guide the purchase of new devices and make the most of existing ones. As a result, much of the cost of printing remains invisible.

These and other challenges face businesses every day, particularly businesses that grow quickly and in remote markets.

[Source: Quocirca Tackling print costs in the midmarket, March 2010]