The cheapest way of getting the most commonly used programs is by purchasing the Home and Student version that includes Word, Excel and Powerpoint. This can be installed on up to 3 computers and currently retails for only £85.

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So, it’s 3 months since the launch of Windows 7 and it seems to proving fairly popular in our experience. Customers are actively seeking new laptops with Windows 7, rather than trying to avoid Vista and purchase XP. They are now taking the opportunity to buy new desktops with Windows 7 preinstalled, and people are also inquiring about the possibility of upgrading their system to Windows 7.

On the whole, the majority of systems that have Vista will be able to be upgraded. If anything, they will run better, as Windows 7 starts up quicker and runs more efficiently. A memory upgrade will help but is not always necessary.

Before taking the plunge and purchasing an upgrade disk, it is advisable to run the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor . Please note that you cannot upgrade from Windows XP to Windows 7. You will need to do a clean install.

It is advisable that you back up any data you consider to be important before attempting an upgrade, as there is always the potential for something to go wrong and you losing your data. A clean install needs everything to be wiped so a backup is essential. Programs cannot be copied using a backup, so they will need to be reinstalled using original disks or downloaded files. License keys and product activation will also be necessary afterwards, something that usually causes problems after clean installs, with people rummaging through drawers full of old disks in a frantic search for the originals.

The actually upgrade itself is usually pretty straight forward once the recommendations of the Upgrade Advisor have been followed (usually uninstalling incompatible software such as anti-virus), although it can take many hours, so be patient.

Once the upgrade is complete Windows 7 will have installed most of the drivers for your devices automatically and everything works!

Why use Hosted Exchange?
Hosted Exchange is ideal for the small business user that wants to keep their devices synchronised without having to dock the device and manually synchronise. Email sent from the handheld will be in the Sent Items folder on their email client (eg Outlook). New contacts added will be listed in their address book.
Users also get access to Web Outlook and emails are automatically backed up on the server.

How much does it cost?
Hosted Exchange services cost £9.50 per month per user.

Farewell XP
The launch of Windows 7 now means Microsoft have withdrawn the sale of Windows XP. Finchfield IT’s suppliers only have a few copies left for sale, and we have already had several customers requesting installation of XP over their Vista installation, rather than opting to upgrade to Windows 7. XP has been a good stable system for the past 9 years but the time has come to move on. I’m sure many people will miss XP and it seems harsh to remove people’s choice. However, it would be difficult for Microsoft to continue to support 3 operating systems indefinitely. Updates and fixes for XP will continue to be released for 5 years, so you don’t have to ditch XP yet.

Of course, those people wishing to continue with XP for some time yet can always consider upgrading their current system to keep them going.

Virus Alert!!
A bit of common sense, but we’ve seen a few people caught out by this one again recently. If you get an email from DHL, UPS or any other delivery company regarding delivery of items, DO NOT open the attachment. It’s a virus. A delivery company will never email you an attachment regarding failure of delivery.

Finchfield IT News

Adoption Web Portal
Finchfield IT have recently won the contract to supply Adoption Black Country with a web portal to enable social workers to show approved adopters children waiting to be adopted. This enables social workers across the Black Country to upload details of children for potential adopters to view online. This enables the adoption agencies involved to have more up to date details for potential adopters than the current monthly magazine that is circulated.

Online Backup
Finchfield IT are now offering an online data backup service for £7.50 per month for up to 25GB of data. The backup runs constantly, meaning your work is backed up as you create it. No need for someone to remember to change tapes or hard drives at the beginning and end of the day. Your data is secure so that, in the unlikely event of fire, flood or theft, you can be back up and running with your data recovered from the backup servers. All data is secure and encrypted, and setup is through a simple, user-friendly interface.

We welcome any feedback and comment about our website.  Will plan to add and evolve content so please bookmark our site and come back soon!

This is an excellent business machine with excellent specification to perform well with Vista. It also comes with the option to downgrade to XP Professional should you wish to do so.

Only £445 plus VAT.

Acer 17″ monitor only £69 plus VAT, including 3 year warranty.

The download will be available from http://www.microsoft.com/download if you want to try it.
In my opinion it doesn’t look a great deal different to Vista, but the performance is better.

Transfer of files is certainly quicker and I like the addition of the netwroking features that make it easier to share files between computers and set up wireless networks (perhaps not so good for us, seeing as people will be able to do it for themselves more).

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