Directive Blogs

Overshadowed by the new iPad Air and iPad Mini announcement, on October 22nd Apple launched its new Operating System OS X Mavericks. This new OS is sleek, efficient, and free. Wait, a free Apple product? Really? Yes really. Is this too good to be true? Let's take a look at this new OS and find out.

If your business has never experienced a major computer problem, then it's easy to underestimate just how damaging downtime can be. This conclusion can be drawn from a recent survey of small business owners, where 65% estimated they would only lose $500 if their company's network went down for a day. In reality, downtime is much more costly than $500.

One year ago, Microsoft took a big gamble when they released Windows 8 with a new user interface that strayed from their successful twenty year-old template. Throughout the year, Microsoft has been listening to user feedback and they have recently addressed the biggest issues with Windows 8.1, the first major upgrade to Microsoft's newest OS.

The way you treat customers, handle their feedback, and serve their needs can be the most powerful selling point of your business. Customer satisfaction comes down to the way customers feel after they've made a purchase. Your customer service policy can either make or break your business. Here's how to bulletproof your customer service policy.

As a small business, your goal should not only be to survive, but to thrive. Many times, small businesses try to cut costs by not purchasing essential equipment and services. Unfortunately, because of its cost, technology ends up on the backburner of the priority list. Don't cut corners. Here are seven tech assets you need to invest in.

The modern IT landscape is dramatically changing from a model where an IT department controls everything, to companies outsourcing their IT services. This paradigm shift challenges older ideas about traditional network security equating ownership and control with strong security. Does your business view IT outsourcing as a security help or a hindrance?

Perouse the YouTube comments on any popular video and it will appear like a teenybopper is texting a neo nazi. The level of stupidity seen in the comments of YouTube is the ultimate proof of human idiocy. Finally, after years of putting up with people's hate and ignorance, YouTube is cracking down on comments!

Improving your computer's startup time is a great way to get more productivity out of your work day. Studies have shown that people are most productive during the early hours of the day; therefore, you don't want to waste your best hours waiting for a PC to load. Here are three easy tips you can do to improve your PC's boot up time.

When experiencing a computer problem, what is the first thing you do to troubleshoot it? If you are an experienced PC user, then you will try turning your machine on and off again. Your computer's restart button can feel like a magic wand that takes care of any issue, but do you know how this fix-it wizardry works?

You've seen them around everywhere. Every time you watch TV, look at a poster, listen to the news, or have a conversation with a teenager, you'll be exposed to the term "hashtag". What are hashtags exactly? What do they do? Why should you care about them? How can they help your business? #readmoretofindout

According to a new study from the International Data Corporation, tablets are expected to outsell PCs for the first time in the fourth quarter of 2014. While mobile device sales have been trending this way for years, this is the first time the mighty PC will be dethroned by a gadget. What does this mean for your business?

Mobile devices give you the ability to always be connected with the virtual world. It may seem like this is great for productivity because you feel like more work is getting done; but could it be that constant connectivity is wearing us down? In light of the stresses caused from being connected, it's good to unplug and recharge your brain.

Chances are, you've sat through some really exciting and useful webinars. But, there's probably more of a chance that you've sat through some pretty dull ones as well. Have you ever considered hosting your own?

Every once ina while, a radical piece of technology is introduced to the market that has the potential to change everything. Over the last half century alone, digital music, cell phones, GPS technology, PCs, and much more hit the market and changed the way technology is incorporated into our daily lives and workplaces. Is Google Glass the next revolutionary gadget?

In its infancy, social media was adopted by teenagers and used to share personal opinions. Many businesses took their sweet time adopting social media as part of their marketing strategy, supposing it to be a fad. Now that social media has grown up, almost every business has a social media presence, yet many companies still ban its use in the workplace.

If you are still running your business or home PC on Windows XP, then it's vital that you upgrade to a newer OS. Yes, your decade-old Windows XP system may be working just fine, and therefore, you may not feel the urgency to upgrade, but you will feel the heat next year when Microsoft stops supporting its popular operating system.

If a hacker manages to get their grubby hands on your computer, you're going to have a bad time. Of course, how bad of a time you have depends on your hacker's intentions. There are several things hackers can do to harm you, here are four of the most common ways hackers can disrupt your life.

Have you ever talked with an IT technician about how technology works, and one minute into their explanation you zone out and can't understand a word they're saying? They're speaking English, you recognize the words, yet you can't make sense of anything. In situations like this, you need an interpreter that speaks technologese, we can help.

If you haven't yet upgraded from Windows XP, then you (and 500 million users) must have strong reasons for hanging on to a twelve year old product. Unfortunately, everybody's strong reasons won't hold water come April 8th, 2014 when Microsoft stops supporting XP with new security patches.

Have you ever wondered how cloud computing got its name? Despite popular opinion, cloud computing has nothing to do with the clouds in the sky. Instead, information is transferred to and from data centers, which are shaped nothing like clouds. Yet, there are similarities between the two clouds. We will compare them side-by-side to help you better understand cloud computing.