Archive for October, 2019

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

FlexJobs Identifies Remote Career Fields With $100K+ Salaries

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 28, 2019 by itnerd

Remote work is on the rise, having increased 91% in the last 10 years in the United States. With full-time remote work consistently reported as the most desirable type of flexible work arrangement, FlexJobs, which specializes in remote and other flexible jobs, has detailed 26 remote jobs from eight career categories that all have the potential to pay $100K+ per year. The premium job service has also offered 10 tips on how job seekers can prove themselves as qualified remote workers during the interview process.

The majority of the remote jobs below are high-level positions that require higher education and multiple years of experience. The pay rate is based on data from PayScale.

Career Fields with High-Paying Remote Job Potential

Computer & IT Remote Jobs

Computer Security Remote Jobs

Engineering Remote Jobs

Marketing Remote Jobs

Medical Remote Jobs

Project/Product Manager Remote Jobs

Sales and Business Development Remote Jobs

Software Developer Remote Jobs

High-paying remote jobs are highly competitive and coveted. Because they require a unique set of skills, job seekers should be prepared to showcase their competency and fit as a remote worker. After conveying one’s remote work experience and skills intentionally through strategic cover letters and resumes, job seekers can then demonstrate during the interview process that they have the skills and knowledge to be an outstanding virtual worker.

10 Tips to Prepare and Showcase Remote Work Expertise During an Interview:

  1. Prepare a designated interview space free from clutter and distraction to have the meeting.
  2. Download and test the software that will be used for the interview (it’s okay to ask ahead of time what platform will be used).
  3. Turn on the webcam prior to a video call to check your surroundings and ensure nothing within view is in motion or inappropriate.
  4. Close all unnecessary software, turn off notifications on your computer and phone, and make sure your computer is fully charged.
  5. Place the video meeting window at the top of the screen, as close to your computer’s camera as possible.
  6. Dress professionally (not just from the shoulders up) and avoid fabric or jewelry that might disturb a microphone or be too busy or shiny on screen.
  7. Offer to give a tour of your office or share the photos to showcase a highly functional remote home office environment.
  8. Talk tech – digital communication is essential for all teams, but it plays a particularly important role when workers are based in different locations. Promising candidates are aware of various communication and collaboration tools, such as Trello, Slack, and Google Docs, and they showcase a willingness to learn new ones.
  9. Demonstrate awareness of common remote work pitfalls such as unplugging after hours, distractions, or loneliness, and the steps you will take to minimize them.
  10. Share a remote work backup plan in case you experience a power outage, tech or Internet issues.

For more information please visit https://www.flexjobs.com/blog/post/high-paying-work-from-home-jobs/

Leave a comment »

Windows 10 Requires A Microsoft Account To Install…. Here’s How You Get Around This

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 25, 2019 by itnerd

Something that Microsoft has done recently that is in my mind a real step backwards is that when you set up a new Windows 10 computer, you need a Microsoft Account to set it up. And there appears to be no way around that via setting up a local account which used to be an option in the Windows 10 setup process. But that option has appeared to have disappeared in the setup process that you are presented with at present.

But there actually is a way to work around this. Actually three of them which are really simple:

  • Option 1: Start the setup process WITHOUT a network connection. This will force the Windows 10 setup process to present you with the option to create a local account and skip the requirement for a Microsoft Account.
  • Option 2: If you started the setup process with a network connection and are presented with the prompt to enter or create a Microsoft Account, hit the back arrow at the top left of the screen to go back to the previous screen and disconnect from your network by either turning off WiFi or disconnecting your Ethernet cable. Then click next on the bottom right corner and you should be presented with the option to create a local account. 
  • Option 3: If you started the setup process with a network connection and are presented with the prompt to enter or create a Microsoft Account, disconnect from your network by either turning off WiFi or disconnecting your Ethernet cable. Then try creating a Microsoft account and you’ll see a “Something went wrong” error message. You can then click “Skip” to skip the Microsoft account creation process.

This requirement to have a Microsoft Account just to install an operating system is another data point in a pattern of behavior from Microsoft where choice is being taken away and being replaced by “do it our way or it’s the highway.” That’s very troubling and Microsoft would be well advised to reconsider this as people want choice. At least in this case, there are ways around what Microsoft would like you to do.

1 Comment »

ASUS Republic of Gamers Announces Game Deals

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 24, 2019 by itnerd

ASUS Republic of Gamers (ROG) today announced Game Deals, a program that offers registered ROG product owners unique access to up to 50% off MSRP on a huge range of PC games. Created in collaboration with Gamesplanet, Game Deals will be available worldwide through the Armoury Crate application starting October 23. As Gamesplanet is an official partner to many of the game industry’s top publishers, Game Deals will include a wide variety of titles from Activision Blizzard, Ubisoft, Rockstar, 2K, Bethesda, Bandai Namco, Konami, and many other game publishers.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is among the first special deals available the week of October 23. Registered ROG VIPs can pre-order one of the year’s most anticipated upcoming titles at a price exclusive to ROG.

These new Game Deals are integrated into Armoury Crate software, which provides a single, centralized platform for gamers to purchase, download and personalize their PCs for the perfect game experience. ROG is passionate about engineering innovative gaming machines with deep customization options so that every gamer can create their ideal system. Through this collaboration with Gamesplanet, ROG will finally be able to offer gamers a crucial part of their user experience: easier and more affordable access to the games they love to play.

Anyone who has purchased an ROG product is eligible to become an ROG VIP. All users need to do is create an ROG ID and register their devices. Owners of ROG gaming laptops can create an ROG ID at the ASUS official website or within the User Center section of the Armoury Crate app, available for download at the Windows Store. Owners of other ROG products can download and install Armoury Crate from the official website and then create an ROG ID within the User Center section of the app.

Registered ROG VIPs get exclusive pricing on five or more specially selected titles each week, in addition to a wide collection of everyday deals powered by Gamesplanet. Offers can encompass everything from massive AAA blockbusters to cult indie hits, pre-orders for future favorites, or a host of critically acclaimed classics. Launched games can see deep discounts of up to 50% off MSRP, while game pre-orders will be available for up to 30% off MSRP.

The rotating calendar of special deals will always feature at least five offers with prices not available anywhere else but ROG.

Once they’ve selected a game they would like to purchase, users will complete a one-time process of creating a Gamesplanet account, and then proceed through the purchase process as normal. After redeeming the game code they receive and installing their new title, the game can be added to their Game Library in Armoury Crate. The Game Library feature will be available soon and lets users launch, organize, and keep track of the games they’ve downloaded on any platform, all in one place.

Ready to glow

In addition to collaborating with Gamesplanet, ROG has been working closely with ecosystem partners in gaming, including game developers and studios to offer users a more personalized and unique gaming experience just for ROG users.

Within the Game Deals section of Armoury Crate, users can also find a section with exclusive Aura Ready titles developed to work seamlessly with Aura RGB. When players download titles such as Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 or Anthem, they will experience Aura lighting effects queued to in-game events that deepen the immersion of their gaming experiences. More titles are being added to the Aura Ready program regularly and will be showcased within Game Deals as soon as they launch.

Deeper PC personalization
Armoury Crate software was created to give users access to all of the customization and system optimization settings they could need in a single, easily accessible utility.
Over the years, it’s grown to include Aura Sync personalization that allows users to perfect their gaming environments with coordinated lighting effects across their full ecosystem of compatible devices. Scenario Profiles let users define their system’s personalization settings and performance for any task. Armoury Crate has even expanded to a mobile app that provides gamers with ROG gaming laptops with a way to
monitor their CPU and GPU load on a second screen, adjust optimizing operational modes on demand, and more.

Since these personalized touches matter most in combination with the games users love to play, Game Deals is an integral part of the Armoury Crate vision to create the perfect gaming experience. With this new update, ROG is closer to ensuring that users can get everything they need from ROG devices, from deep personalization to easier access to great and affordable games.

Celebrating launch

To kick off the launch of Game Deals, huge deals on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, The Outer Worlds, eFootball PES 2020, Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire, and Age of Wonders: Planetfall will be available between October 23 and October 30. Additionally, ROG and Gamesplanet will be giving away two free titles to ROG VIPs: Regions of Ruin and We Are the Dwarves, while supplies last.

AVAILABILITY & PRICING

Game Deals is now available worldwide through the Armoury Crate application.

Leave a comment »

Canadian Businesses Lagging In Digital Transformation Projects: Cisco

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 24, 2019 by itnerd

A new report released today from Cisco finds that Canada ranks 11th of 13 countries when it comes to strategically implementing projects that would support digital transformation, with only 40% of Canadian IT leaders reporting their organizations have done so.

The findings are part of Cisco’s first-ever 2020 Global Networking Trends Report, which explores how advanced networking technologies are dramatically changing networking models and operations. The report also aims to help IT leaders understand their network’s critical multi-domain role facilitating new and emerging IT and business trends.

Additional findings from the report include:

  • 23% of Canadian IT leaders and network strategists reported their network architectures are at the minimum maturity level, compared to only 8% on average.
  • Canadian IT leaders believe that ‘lack of budget or resources’ and being ‘too busy maintaining current network’ are the biggest obstacles slowing down their organization’s transition to an advanced network.
  • To achieve their ‘ideal’ vision of the network, 47% of network strategists report that investing in new network infrastructure equipment would help the most.

 

The full report can be found here.

Leave a comment »

Google Pixel 4 Is Now Available At TELUS

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 24, 2019 by itnerd

The Google Pixel 4 is now available in-store at TELUS starting at $0 upfront with TELUS Easy Payment, which allows customers to get any smartphone in our lineup for as little as $0 upfront, combined with new Peace of Mind rate plans that offer endless data without having to worry about overage charges.

The Pixel 4 is the phone made the Google way – bringing together the best of Google hardware, software and AI together. Key features include:

  • Helps you get the perfect photo –  Get fast and easy access to Night Sight from the main camera menu and capture rich detail and colour, even in the dark.
  • The Google Assistant at its best – Multitask and work across apps using your voice. Plus, enjoy an easy and fast way to control your phone and navigate your apps.
  • A new way to control your phone – Skip songs, snooze alarms, and silence calls just by waving your hand.

You can get the Google Pixel 4 in store or online at this link.

 

Leave a comment »

Infographic: Child Identity Theft 101

Posted in Commentary on October 24, 2019 by itnerd

child-identity-theft-101

Source: The Litvak Law Firm: https://nyccrimelawyer.com/

Leave a comment »

Schneider Electric Study Reveals The Impact Of Hyperscale Data Centers On The Modern Value Chain

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 23, 2019 by itnerd

Schneider Electric today announced findings from a new study that sheds light on how hyperscale and colocation trends are impacting the current dynamics and future model of the data center value chain.

As the demand for data center capacity continues to grow – CapEx spending from the top hyperscale operators totaled a record $120 billion in 2018, the role of the value chain — consulting engineers, construction managers, electrical contractors, and distributors/integrators — has never been more important, but the challenges they face continue to intensify.  Schneider Electric’s new report, The Impact of Hyperscale Data Centers: How the Wave is Changing the Value Chain, reveals how the individual value chain members’ roles have evolved, what their leading pain points are, and what they believe is needed to succeed in this new industry reality.

Adapting to Hyperscale

Overall, the report found that while new technology constructs such as open architectures, edge deployments, the software-defined data center (SDDC), prefab, and AI/digitization are having profound impacts on all members of the value chain, the majority of value chain respondents agree hyperscale presents the biggest positive impact to their businesses.

The increase on profit margins and opportunity to gain new skills and expertise were some of the most significant opportunities presented. However, hyperscale has also amplified the impact of the industry’s ongoing skilled labor shortage, which ranked as a top challenge and day-to-day pain point across the value chain.

The Modern-Day Value Chain

Members of the value chain agreed that increased collaboration – across roles as well as with end-users and manufacturers – and transparency are key to overcoming these challenges and supporting longer-term hyperscale success.

“Hyperscale has fundamentally transformed the data center market. Its scale and complexity have had a similarly profound impact on what we call the value chain, the ecosystem of people involved in bringing such immense capacity to life,” says Frank Nash, Senior Director, Secure Power, Schneider Electric. “What today’s report reveals is that the value chain is poised to take advantage of hyperscale’s potential and is evolving with the era, but persistent and new challenges are driving a modern approach to engagement and collaboration. Each member of the value chain plays a more significant role in the process to make it faster and more cost-effective than ever before.”

Key Takeaways

The insights revealed in Schneider Electric’s report, The Impact of Hyperscale Data Centers: How the Wave is Changing the Value Chain, serve as guidance to value chain members as they consider their roles over the next decade, as well as manufacturers and vendors when it comes to better understanding the people they work with.

“By creating a portrait of today’s value chain, we get to the heart of the shifts so we can better understand and cater to the unique needs of these critical industry players,” adds Nash.

Explore and interact with the findings by visiting our interactive infographic, a dynamic web experience that showcases topline results from this report. To access the complete report, The Impact of Hyperscale Data Centers: How the Wave is Changing the Value Chain, click here.

* The findings of this report are based on a survey which yielded responses from 204 North American hyperscale and colocation data center decision makers spanning engineering, construction management, distributor/integrator, electrical contractor roles.

Leave a comment »

Expansion To The Edge Portfolio For Modern Software-Defined Networking By Dell Technologies

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 22, 2019 by itnerd

Today Dell EMC introduced the newest member of its Virtual Edge Platform (VEP) family, the VEP1405 series – a high-value, purpose-built open fixed compact form factor uCPE platform to host VNFs.

The Dell EMC VEP1405 series connects the enterprise to the edge via universal Customer Premise Equipment (uCPE), uniting branch locations to the cloud and complementing its larger VEP4600 predecessor.

As next-generation technologies develop, service provider and enterprise customers are having to modernize infrastructure from the data center all the way out to the network edge for enabling innovation, controlling costs, reducing complexity and providing scalability. The VEP1405 will help customers build out their infrastructure of the future by offering software-defined networking at the edge in a very small, affordable package that offers flexibility.

You can find out more details in this blog post.

Leave a comment »

A Smaller Footprint Can Mean Bigger Business: OVHcloud

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 22, 2019 by itnerd

Since today is World Energy Day, OVHcloud wants to remind businesses of the importance of decreasing energy use. It’s easy for businesses to overlook whether completing effective work is necessarily energy-efficient work, and we want to help change that.

OVHcloud is an exemplified leader in Green IT – with 30 data centres around the globe run at 98% without the use of air conditioning – thanks to ground-breaking water-cooling technology and advanced design on its servers.

Within their report, Industrialization of the Data Centre, OVHcloud highlights the ways in which data centers can effectively and sustainably get the job done:

  • Utilize unorthodox means of cooling to help the environment OVHcloud has used liquid cooling in OVHcloud data centres for the past 15 years and is now using it to cool 380,000 commoditized servers. OVHcloud’s DC location, south of Montréal, is stationed near a hydroelectric plant, sustaining clean and renewable energy consumption.
  • Use autonomous monitoring and control By moving from centralized cooling, centralized power, and centralized distribution to granular control at the rack level, you’re able to control levels of reliability, density and power consumption, eliminating overprovisioning and minimizing unnecessary energy use by controlling the behaviour.
  • Operate in stages, keeping power density in mind and operational levels low One of the main issues in data centers is power density – the more equipment there is in a given space, the hotter it gets. By keeping in mind, the longevity of equipment – moving on from simply switching servers “on and off”, and operating in stages, reduces cost and increases ROI.

 

Leave a comment »

Review: TP-Link AX6000 WiFi Router

Posted in Products with tags on October 22, 2019 by itnerd

I’m just going to get to the point. If you want consistent speed and a router that is future proof, you need to get the TP-Link AX6000 WiFi Router. Period. End of story.

Actually, you’re looking for more than that statement as to why you should spring just under $400 USD for a router. I can help you with that. Let me show you the router:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

So I will admit that this looks like one of those gaming routers from companies like Asus. But the antennas are foldable, and the lighting isn’t over the top. Here’s where things get interesting:

AX6000-5

As you can see here you get a USB-A and a USB-C port for printers and storage devices. But more importantly it has 8 Ethernet ports and 1 2.5 GB Ethernet port. The latter is more important as ISPs are going above the Gigabit mark when it comes to the service that they provide, and your router has to be able to keep up with that. But don’t ignore the fact that it has 8 Ethernet ports as link aggregation is on board for those who have devices like NAS devices with multiple Ethernet ports where you can bond those ports together to get extra speed. 

Other features include:

  • 802.11ax (also known as Wi-Fi 6)
  • Dual band wireless. It has 1148 Mbps on 2.4GHz (802.11ax) + 4804 Mbps on 5GHz (802.11ax)
  • 1.8GHz 64-bit Quad-Core CPU
  • Antivirus provided by Trend Micro
  • A Quality of Service feature that lets you prioritise traffic by type, such as streaming or gaming.
  • Parental controls which are easy to set up and use.

Setting this router up was absurdly easy. I went the route of using the web page and had it set up on my Gigabit Internet connection in five minutes. But you can also use the TP-Link Tether App to do the same thing.

But let’s get down to brass tacks. What is the performance like? Let’s start with speed. I will simply let this picture speak for itself:

Screen Shot 2019-10-21 at 5.40.54 PM

Now this test was done over WiFi a few feet from the router. It’s also is the fastest speed that I have recorded in all the years that I have been testing routers. I’ll also point out that I was using an 802.11ac MacBook Pro to do this testing. Which means that this router if you use an 802.11ax device you might get even better performance. Another thing to point out is that unlike most routers where the speed that I get during my testing is all over the place, I was consistently getting speeds above 800 Mbps. That was impressive. So is the fact that this router was fast all over my sub 1000 ft condo where range is sometimes an issue with routers that I test.

Now, who should buy this router? I see several use cases:

  • If you want to future proof yourself, buy this router.
  • If you want performance in terms of speed and range, buy this router.
  • If you have a ton of devices on Ethernet that you want to connect to your router, buy this router.

The fact is that I am going to have a tough time giving this router back to TP-Link as I was very impressed with it. And I believe that you will be impressed with it as well. Sure it’s not cheap, but it’s very much worth it given the performance and versatility that you get.

 

Leave a comment »

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »