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Be Less Annoying
2008-05-06 21:33:00
You could say that’s our mantra… 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 ...
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5 things all IT buyers MUST ask before buying refurbished IT equipment
2008-01-14 22:20:00
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 ...
More About: Equipment , Things , Buyers

Slashdot Anniversary Party Recap
2007-10-19 21:37:00
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 ...
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Cable Messes: Want Meatballs with that?
2007-09-27 17:47:00
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 ...
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Interview with Venderis Founder, Robert Davie
2007-09-06 22:33:00
Robert Davie, Founder of Vender is 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.” —————— ;—————̵ 2;—————R 12;————— 212;——— In a nutshell, what does Venderis do? “I ...
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Vibrant Technologies - Best Place to Work
2007-08-22 16:24:00
The Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal’s 9th annual “Best Place s 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 ...
More About: Technologies , Logies , Logi

PS3: Your mother(board) was a blade server!
2007-08-09 22:05:00
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 Data Center Knowledge blog keanly observes: The powerful processor is no stranger to the data center, as it is also being used in IBM System X blade servers ...
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Google runs 100 Billion Servers
2007-08-07 21:57:00
OK, maybe not quite yet… but Pandia Search Engine News is reporting that Googl e 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 ...
More About: Servers , Bill , Runs

Open Source Server Hardware?
2007-08-02 23:13:00
Earlier this year, Nat Torkington of the O’Reilly Radar blog, asked “Is ‘Open Source ’ Now Completely Meaningless?” 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 ...
More About: Hardware , Open-Source

Seven Wonders of the Tech World
2007-07-07 11:45:00
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. —————— ;—————̵ 2;—————R 12;————— 212;——- Googleplex Google has rapidly become a permanent cornerstone in the technology world, so it?s an obvious first stop on ...
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Best of Interop Schwag 2007
2007-06-05 17:55:00
Network Computing Magazine hosts an annual “Best of Interop ” awards program at the Interop Las Vegas show in the spring for the best new products offered by exhibitors at the show. This really helps the casual networking specialist sort through the hundred of exhibitors and products offered. Vibrant noticed an important category missing in the ...
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Vibrant at Interop 2007
2007-06-05 17:01:00
Interop Las Vegas 2007 was a successful show for Vibrant. We met many current networking clients as well as hopefully several future ones. There are definitely many end-users and resellers interested in used Cisco, used Servers and the secondary IT hardware market. The show was very active with close to 20,000 attendees, 450 exhibitors and ...
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Interop Twitter Hunt 2007
2007-05-21 06:03:00
What is a Twitter hunt? It’s a simple treasure hunt, except the clues are given out via Twitter. In our case, we’ll be giving out $200 in chips to the person who can find Vibrant’s own Lindsi Gish somewhere within Interop Las Vegas at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center. Between 2 and 4PM on Wednesday, May ...
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Our CEO is so 40 under Forty
2007-05-19 01:32:00
Fun news today at Vibrant Technologies as our CEO, Jennifer VanDerHorst was recognized as one of the top 40 “accomplished professionals” under the age of forty in the annual special section of the Minneapolis St. Paul Business Journal. She was chosen out of a field of 280 nominees for this prestigious list. Thanks to Heidi Carpenter ...
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What I Love about Minnesota
2007-04-25 01:03:00
An “I Love Minnnesota” meme has been started by Aaron Weiche of the Find Buffalo Blog and we’ve been tagged by Patrick Schaber of Transition Networks and local marketing blog, The Lonely Marketer! Spring is a great time of year to kick off this meme, because if it had been launched in February instead, I’m pretty ...
More About: Minnesota

The Top Enterprise IT Bloggers
2007-04-23 18:31:00
There are endless numbers of tech bloggers online, but finding those that cover enterprise IT is a bit more challenging. For the past several months, I’ve been compiling a list of the best that I could find. Quick observations: Sun is the runaway blogging leader. HP has a ways to go, as does Cisco, but ...
More About: Bloggers , Enter , Rise , Enterprise , Logger

Alive and Kicking at Vibrant
2007-04-20 16:44:00
Things have been quiet at The Remarketer the past week, but we’ve been quite busy behind the scenes. Blog posts are on the way here soon, but I just wanted to list some of the opportunities that we’ve been lucky enough to have get in the way. Hiring As a growing firm, we’re almost always hiring, but ...
More About: Rant , Live , Brant , King , Alive

Sun?s Project Blackbox stops in Minneapolis
2007-04-06 07:44:00
Last week, Sun Microsystem's Project Black box (aka The DatacenterMobile) finally made a stop in Minneapolis, but alas, daycare couldn't be lined up and I didn't make it over to the St. Thomas campus to get a tour. I don't feel like I completely missed out though, because TechnologyEvangelist.com offered a great video of Sun's Twin Cities visit. Find out where Project Blackbox is now. project blackbox, sun microsystems
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Vibrant?s Guitar Hero Happy Hour
2007-03-13 23:34:00
To celebrate the end of the shortest (yet longest) month of the year, to do some fun team-building and just to have fun, Vibrant hosted its first Video Game Happy Hour . We had video games (Boxing & Tennis on the Wii, Guitar Hero projected on a 15′ wall, DDR, Parapa, NES, etc…) set up throughout the ...
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Last-Minute Daylight Savings Time Change Fixes - Enterprise Guide
2007-03-07 02:04:02
At lunch yesterday, I was amazed to find out that the two co-workers joining me hadn’t yet realized that daylight savings time goes into effect this coming weekend. Of course, they aren’t responsible for any of our company’s or client’s IT hardware or computer systems. Otherwise they most certainly would have been aware that Daylight Savings Time is starting a month earlier this year due to new US regulations. Just in case any IT admins out there have gotten (way) behind on their DST07 updates, here is a summary of where you can find help for various manufacturers: Daylight Savings Time Change (2007) Resources: IBM Servers and Storage - A Grid of IBM’s DST updates Sun Microsystems - Sun’s BigAdmin guide to DST07 HP Servers - HP Support Document Microsoft Servers - Overview of Updates for Microsoft Windows OS for servers and workstations Novell SUSE Linux Servers - Explains how linux handles DST Red Hat Linux Servers - Red Hat Knowledgebase...
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Google?s Hard Drive Study on SATA Disks
2007-02-24 13:55:02
This month Google released their compiled data on hard drive performance from their datacenters around the world. When you’re Google, this type of study is far beyond the anecdotal reports that can be found on gear forums like “I picked up these piece of $&@# Drive s from (xyz low-end drive manufacturer) and one already crapped out!” Instead, Google basically posted “We’ve got these datacenters all over the world with over 100,000 cheap SATA and PATA drives between them and a bunch crapped out!”, oh yeah and here is some great insight into the circumstances under which this occurred. Over 5 years, they recorded every failure and many variables and then repurposed it into an independent report unprecedented in size. Here are some of Google’s hard drive findings: 1) Temperature surprisingly didn’t have much influence on failure rates. Warm or cold, Google didn’t report much statistical variance here. 2) Older Drives fail more...
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Sun?s DataCenterMobile, the Wienermobile and other type hits
2007-02-23 13:55:01
When I first heard that Sun’s Data center in a Box was slated to go on a tour of the USA, the first thing that came to mind was naturally the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile. Sun shouldn’t take this as a slight though, I think it’s a brilliant move, and I tip my hat to them as a competitor (we sell used Sun servers). Anyhow, in looking into this, I discovered there is a whole world of these product themed cars. Here is our List of 11 Traveling Product-mobiles, starting with the legend. 1) Oscar Meyer’s Wienermobile (The Grand-Daddy of product-mobiles) Created in Chicago in 1936 to promote Meyer’s wieners, the giant hot-dog on wheels still visits the grocery stores, parades and state fairs of the nation. Six vehicles reportedly travel during the summer hosting 12 lucky college kids. Out of over 1000 applicants only these fortunate few get to attend “Hot Dog High” in Madison, WI and embark on a sticky summer promoting processed meat. “No one...
More About: Mobile , Other , Cent , Type

US Presidents and Technology: 1980-2007
2007-02-20 13:53:01
In commemoration of this President ’s Day, we’ve decided to take a look back at the last four US presidencies and their policies on technology as well as their personal use of it. Looking back at Campaign ‘92 Presidential candidates have made a lot of noise this year adopting new technology to announce and promote their campaigns. Democratic candidates have stepped out first with Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Barack Obama announcing their presidential runs via online video and Republican candidates won’t be far behind. Some believe whomever can adapt to new communication methods (ala Kennedy over Nixon in 1960) will seize the presidency. But new communication was also coming to light as early as 1992. The MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory set up the “Campaign92 Server” that would serve up candidate information to anybody who subscribed. Candidates were asked to submit political literature including policy papers, speeches, press releas...
More About: Technology , Techno , Tech , Presidents

NetworkWorld Blogs - Good Stuff
2007-02-17 01:50:02
I don’t know if I would expect any less from the people behind Network World Magazine, but the material that is regularly turned out at NetworkWorld.com’s blogs is engaging, interesting, topical and funny. I’ve been converted to a daily reader. NetworkWorld.com Community - A rolling update of the latest blogs by their staff, plus occasional entries by site users NetworkWorld Blog s - A list of their 11 networking and enterprise IT blogs with current posts (podcasts too) Here are a couple of recent highlights from NW: Enough with the alerts already - “What is up with all these Cisco security alerts lately?” Do Free Web hosting services welcome phishers? - “‘’It’s like shooting phishers in a barrel’” There are also weekly caption contests and some good comment strings. I’m sure you’ll see NW in our roundup posts from time to time. it blogs, network world, networking, networkworld
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How to Attract IT Students at College Job Fairs
2007-02-16 01:50:01
From our experience running booths at college and university job fairs, there is a simple sure-fire way to attract and recruit IT and IS students to your booth. Include the word “technologies” or “technology” in your company name or in big wording on your display materials. The funny thing is, Vibrant generally doesn’t go to college career fairs to recruit IS graduates, because we require several years experience in the field before we consider a systems engineer candidate (we’re looking for entry-level sales and customer service). Regardless, the IT students see the word “technologies” in our company name and introduce themselves almost every time. We certainly hope someday they’ll be our clients, but it’s difficult to explain that we don’t have an immediate opportunity for them. So, if you’re an IT exec, in-house recruiter or independent recruiter looking for new blood from the college ranks, you might want ...
More About: How To , College , Student , Students , Fair

Hockey Pucks and Global IT Hardware Sales
2007-02-09 01:44:02
After a sabbatical that has lasted far too long, we’re back! Last month my wife and I welcomed our first baby into the world, so I took some time off from contributing to the blog. Anyhow, I bet you’re wondering what Hockey Pucks and Global IT Business have to do with one another… Well, we chose to give Hockey Pucks as our Holiday gift to our international clients for 2006. Vibrant has clients throughout the world from South America and Europe to Asia and Australia. Minnesota is known as the “State of Hockey,” and we thought it would be a fun representation of our headquarters here where the lakes are covered with ice and the ice is covered with skate marks. By all accounts, our clients are having fun with them, even if they’re not sure what they’re for. Once client sent us a thank you and said it will make a great paperweight. Another observed that they had no idea the pucks were so heavy and that it all became clear why hockey players w...
More About: Hardware , Sales , Sale , War

SysAdmin of the Year - I?m Buying you a Pizza!
2007-02-09 01:44:02
To the winners of the 2006 SysAdmin of the Year award, Congratulations! In the immortal words of Strongbad: “Now that?s what I?m talking about, that was amazing! I mean.. you… I mean … I?m buying you a pizza!” - As told to The Cheat after he created the Everybody to the Limit / Fhqwhgads video. So if any of the winners, runners-up and honorable mention sysadmins are interested, contact us with your favorite local pizza joint and address and we’ll send you a gift certificate. Hopefully your employers reward you with some real bonuses though (see cash/money). Winners: Grand Prize: Michael Beck, Emerging Technologies Group First Place: Sean Thomas, True Prism Technologies Runners-up: Darren Barry, Micah Anderson, Dawn Lovell Honorable Mention: Mike Jennings, Nik Keating, Russ Steffen, Denis Roy, Justin Hartwell Contest Rules: http://www.sysadminoftheyear.com/rules Notes: I’m really surprised Sean Thomas didn’t win.  I mean, he risked his li...
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Servers in the Movies - Our Top Ten
2007-02-09 01:44:02
A few weeks ago, Corey wrote about the top “Ten Server s that Changed the World.” In reaction, I decided to make my own list… The Ten Servers that Changed the Fictional World. There are two guidelines for this list. One, they must exist only in the world of movies or TV. Second, they need to fit the following definition: A server is a computer system that provides services or data to other computing systems?called clients?over a network or other communication device. With that said, here they are. In no particular order… —————— ;—————̵ 2;—————R 12;————— 212;—————&# 8212;—————& #8212;- 1. Teletraan 1 ? Transformers (1983 ? 2007) You might not know much about the Transformers yet, but by next summer, you will. If a server is a computer system that maintains and controls oth...
More About: Movies , Movie , Top Ten

List Prices and Discounts for Used IT Hardware
2007-02-09 01:44:02
“What is your ‘list price’ for this used IBM Server?” We get this type of question pretty frequently, particularly when we’re selling to a large Fortune 500 Corporation, University or Government Organization. It is almost a knee-jerk reaction to ask as these buyers are conditioned to negotiate discounting directly with manufacturers such as Sun, IBM, HP and EMC. We also get similar questions regarding “educational” or “volume discounts.” While used IT hardware is a fantastic way to save on IT infrastructure costs, negotiating pricing here can present some unique challenges. The Secondary IT Industry and price markers: The used IT hardware industry is essentially an open market. Hardware is traded as a second-hand commodity that can rise or fall depending on perceived availability in the marketplace. List pricing would be impossible to set without collusion by the dozens of dealers who operate in this niche marketplace. This is ...
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Big is the New Small (for IBM Mainframes)
2007-02-09 01:44:02
Smaller chips, smaller servers, smaller datacenters, smaller world… IBM wants you to forget about all that. If you’ve had your ear to IBM’s train tracks, you’ve heard the message too… Big is the New Small. So, when the world is all about blade servers and you want to shift a little love to your system z9 and zSeries mainframe servers, what do you do? Make Big = Easy. Main frames have always been considered cumbersome, complex and difficult to use. IBM is investing $100 million over five years to make the systems and the z/OS easier to work with. Implementation and administration is expected to become much less complex. Understand that students shall inherit the Datacenter.Today’s IT students will be tomorrow’s IT decision makers. IBM realizes this and has taken some smart measures in involving them in zSeries mainframe learning. Evidence of IBM’s Youth Movement - zNextGen Initiative - Photos of IBM’s new faces in zSeries techno...
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