I've personally always had a hard time knowing when it was the right move to bail on a current solution and move whole sale to another to provide myself the best solution. But then I've never been a big business either.

From what I've seen posted here, it sounds like your company needs to migrate away from BigC to a different product that gives you want you want. You're currently paying $1600/month of that, toss in another $400-500 for the added features and you're now at $2100/month total new single product better integration, etc.

it's all about getting management to understand that at the end of the pain, the payoff will be huge.

Is that a Strong Bad reference?

I consider this thread so important that it should some how be featured.

Seeing pricing on the main page or only one click away is a near requirement for me. If you're not willing to show me your price, I'm probably not willing to contact you.

@thanksaj said:

However, if the OP expected the conversation to go one way and it goes the other, and it is on point, my belief has always been to let the conversation play out.

But as the OP of the topic/request, I do feel it's their place to narrow the scope if they don't like a specific direction that things are headed - ultimately that might hurt them, they might not get an answer, but it was their question.

Another thing that I'm sure we all agree upon is that many times people just don't know what they are asking. They've heard a buzz word, or been told 'it must have RAID 5' and so they just go out and ask. The OPs lack of knowledge means they can't really understand what they are being told, so they might think things are going off topic.

@Breffni-Potter said:

Unite IT?
IT Unite?

You want social & tech and have it be short/snappy.

How about

UnITed

@DenisKelley said:

Wow. A ton of posts from beginning to end of this process. I almost feel like the community just helped deliver a baby.

And ever better - We didn't get mod'ed for going off topic

I think one of Scott's points is that you don't need a decked out box to make a lab happen.

I had an old 486 running Novell Netware what seems like 100 years ago, and a Pentium running Windows NT 4.0 This was when P II's were the rage, or was it PIIIs?

10+ year old hardware used to be completely usable for most lab setups. now with Virtualization, you need something a bit newer, x64 and supports virtualization, but that started becoming very common 8 or so years ago, so there's that. But real servers aren't needed either. A desktop can run VMWare ESXi or XenServer or Hyper-V just fine (assuming the virtualization hardware is there). Other factors will limit the number of VMs you can run, but hey, this is a lab.

Then today we can get $5/month VMs online - so there are options.

@hobbit666 said in Unitrends now has Office365 & Cloud backups!!:

Might look at this later this year, once we've signed our MPLS contract and got some space in a DC as i'm looking at Unitrends to backup a few servers to the DC, but will also be looking at our whole Backup and DR strategy in general too. 365/One Drive was one thought I had.

But is it needed? as 365/one drive is cloud based so shouldn't need backing up???? An't that the point of cloud services?

As has recently been discussed - If MS, for example, has an issue, they will restore whole systems back to a healthy state, including your data. But, if a malicious user logs into your O365 system and just starts deleting things, MS has no mechanism to restore things.
Another example, you use OneDrive to sync your file to your local desktop. Your PC gets hit by cryptoware and encrypts all of the files in your OneDrive folder, which are then synced back to MS, MS again has no means of restoring them to a pre-encrypted state.

Wow.. Now I want to know why the EFF isn't backing it. There's probably some horrible pork in there they just can't stand...

@dafyre said:

@scottalanmiller The spice must flow!

This is a horrible tag line! Now we do drugs? lol

We actually have a policy that IT does not help people with shortcuts. If you really need a short cut it's between you and your manager, otherwise we deploy needed internet favorites via GPO, and the rest of the applications are in the start menu(start screen).

@hobbit666 said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:

Sorry not read all the reply's but to answer the question, depends really.

I can't afford a home lab or even a cloud lab, but that doesn't stop me learning "out of hours". Example if i wanted to learn something new and don't have time at work i'm happy to spin up a VM or two on my laptop with Virtual Box get them working then transfer to the test server at work that i can remote into to carry on testing later.

Would i hire someone yes i would, as long as the are keen to learn and willing to play at home as me even on a Virtual Box or similar that would do for me

While you don't have dedicated hardware to your lab, you still have a lab, it's just 100% virtual. that's still a lab.

Don't get hung up on the need to have enterprise class equipment. Enterprise class servers are loud and generally power hungry. Most people wouldn't want them in their homes.

@nadnerb said in Copying Content from other sources:

Going by what I've seen in some other threads here. I think I can see why :t-rex: undies are getting in a twist.
<threadjack>
There's a kids book called "Dinosaurs love underpants"... very funny, may be relevant here...
</threadjack>

Considering we don't have a secret hideout where we can giggle in the shadows. I reckon it's kind of obvious why the request has been made. No one wants to be made to look bad. Even if people feel justified to "call out" things. There's a way to say everything and to be quite honest, some of our threads make them look like:
:man_zombie: :water_closet: :free_button:
(hot zombie crap dancing in a toilet, bad for your health but it's free )

We can't be friends anymore - you're the first person I've personally seen who wrote a sentence in emojis
the world is over.

@scottalanmiller said:

@thecreativeone91 said:

However I think this topic has gone way way off topic already.

Are you suggesting that this topic..... lacks traction control?

Nice.

@MattSpeller said:

My reasons to attend MLCon in order of importance to me:

Meet people and put a face and a hand shake to an avatar

Get out of the office for a few days

See a new place

Learn stuff about junk

Assuming your employer is paying, don't let them see that list.

If a user touches SQL directly or indirectly (though an application) you need a license for them.

You'll need licensing to cover those 45 users.

@david.wiese said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:

I think you basing your decision on hiring someone on whether they have a home lab or not is complete and udder crap. For example, I do have a media "sever" but that is it. I chose to not spend my money (whether it be on a home server or the electricity to power said home server) on things I have access to at work. My time out the office is my time, spent with family, doing things I enjoy. Not having my head buried in technology (I do that enough at work).

Scott you are different than most since you have come out and said that you cannot disconnect from technology (even when you are on vacation). Those like myself like to leave technology at work. When I get home, I usually (if I can) leave my cell phone on the opposite end of my house and spend time outside. When I go on the weekend camping trips, my phone stays in my tent. We as a society have become so dependent on technology to run our daily lives, we lose sight with the fact that the things we did as children, (hanging out with friends, playing at the park and not coming home until dinner...etc.) we no longer do. Most adults have their heads on a permanent 25 degree downward angle with a phone/tablet glued to their hands.

Yes IT is a hobby/passion but that does not mean IT needs to be your life. I think you discounting someone based on if they have a home server or not is total bs.

I'll disagree with this for the following reason(s):

People who are into IT, not just doing it for the money, do it as a hobby as well. They are constantly learning. That's not to say that you have to go home and spend hours and hours working on learning new things.. Maybe it's once a week, or even once a month. The point is, unless your office has lab space you can use on your own time, the chances are that you need a lab to learn new things. I don't know about your job, but my previous jobs never had lab equipment nor dedicated on the clock time for me to learn.. .that was my responsibility. It was like going to school - that was completely on me, on my own time, not up to my office to give me time and resources to do it. Now some better jobs have offered reimbursement for that education after I paid and passed the class.

If you only do IT stuff while on the clock at work, how do you grow and learn new things?

MS is launching a new SP3 that's cheaper than the current generation iPad.

If it's processing power is good enough to run normal day to day apps (not worrying about running AutoCAD, etc) this could really be cool!

Granted, we still need to see developers creating more what are now called Windows Applications (Apps) vs Windows Desktop Apps to take advantage of the tablet features.

I see this as a great place for MS to be.

I still need a brochure for this. Can't get it comped by the office without it.