The Remarketer

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 to annoy either those doing them or their clients. Our goal is to make these interactions more human, and by doing so, hopefully our staff and clients’ days are a bit less stressful. Here are some ways in which we’re less annoying:

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 don’t get burned.

1. Are you getting the real deal?
Is the quoted equipment true manufacturer-branded hardware? (Example: Is the memory IBM or some 3rd party knock-off?) This is HUGE when you try to add hardware to existing maintenance agreements. No 3rd party hardware is typically supported. Sometimes dealers will try to slide 3rd party components into system quotes and hope you won’t notice - or worse yet, they won’t even mention it. Be sure to ask.

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 the top to throw some money at this and put the techs in charge of planning and organizing. Last night we had the party here and I think the results were pretty great.

(Lindsi rolled all the photos and videos into a great montage.)

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.

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A Cable Mess of Beauty
photo by: Cormac Phelan
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Robert Davie, Founder of Venderis 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.”

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In a nutshell, what does Venderis do?

“I need more than a nutshell to describe Venderis… but here goes. Venderis has sort of a dual role. It reduces the risk of data stored on PCs from escaping to the public domain, while at the same time it increases the resale value of PC assets.

The Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal’s 9th annual “Best Places 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 stories about my time here with friends or family. The “perks” of working for an edgy, innovative company range from Video Game Happy Hours to themed summer and holiday parties - but while those events provide occasional entertainment, the fun part is the bonding that takes place between employees.

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 and System Z mainframes.

Players of Warhawk on Playstation 3s take advantage of a server method they call IGS or “Integrated Game Server”, which is essentially distributed computing. This allows players to take advantage of PS3s nearby to reduce latency, but Sony also wanted to have dedicated racks of PS3s available to gamers as well.

OK, maybe not quite yet… but Pandia Search Engine News is reporting that Google 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 US dollars a year on IT equipment. We know that Google make use of a large number of cheap off the shelf servers using open source (and free) LINUX.

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 thinking than a rigid software term? Let’s pretend for a minute it is, and explain how Vibrant’s line of used servers could be considered open source.

1. We don’t care what OS you load onto it once you’ve gotten it… Linux, Windows, AIX, Solaris, go for it!

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.

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Googleplex

Google has rapidly become a permanent cornerstone in the technology world, so it’s an obvious first stop on our tour of the Seven Tech Wonders. The building now known as the Googleplex was originally occupied by Silicon Graphics, Inc. and purchased by Google in June of 2006.