TechKnow | Volume #19 | May 19 2009

In This Issue:
HP Trying to Revive PC Sales with Touch Screens
The CompTIA Security+ Cert
Keeping Up with Evolving Technologies
Tech Toys

Cert-of-the-Week
This week’s Cert-of-the-Week is the MCITP: Database Administrator Certification where you’ll receive $540 off. Check it out for more information or call 1-877-872-4646 M-F 9am-6pm.

IT Jobs Resource Center
An informative IT career resource guide! Our goal is to provide you with the information that you will need to be successful in the competitive IT world.
www.cbtjobs.com

What’d Ya Miss?

Check out our previous newsletters in our archives to keep up-to-date on all the latest from CBT Direct and the world of IT.


HP Trying to Revive PC Sales with Touch Screens

With PC sales down, HP was looking for something to entice consumers to buy a new PC, so they decided to push their fancy touch screen PCs. And although they cost twice as much as a regular PC, they’re using a new marketing strategy to find commercial uses for the touch screens.

Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport now has 50 of these babies for travelers to use to access online maps and restaurant listings. The Detroit Pistons arena has installed touch screens in their luxury boxes for fans to access player statistics and instant replays.

HP’s sales have dropped 15% in desktops last quarter compared to the same period a year ago, and the revenue was down 25%. Will this new touch screen technology be the answer to their slow sales? Read on here.


The CompTIA Security+ Cert

Are you CompTIA Security+ certified? This cert validates your knowledge of systems security, network infrastructure, assessments and audits, access control, cryptography and organization security. You can move ahead more rapidly in your career, stay current and competitive, plus you could earn a salary increase of 20% or more.

The CompTIA Security+ cert is perfect for those IT professionals interested in the following job positions: Senior Field Service Engineer, Network Technician, LAN Administrator, Windows Administrator, Network Security Specialist or Network Security Administrator. If you are interested in more courses like this, take a look at our other security online courses.


Keeping Up with Evolving Technologies

Since so much evolves in IT in a matter of months, IT managers must be able to adapt to new technologies and manage employees of a younger generation who don’t know anything different. Checking email to some workers on a computer rather than instant messages or texts may seem like waiting for the post office to deliver snail mail, and it would be a complete contradiction, especially in the field of IT, to keep it “old school”.

IT employees demand constant communication, mobility and flexibility and normally chose technology over face-to-face contact, such as electronic networking over in-person contact. Younger workers are much more accustomed to things like juggling multiple programs at the same time, being easily accessible during all hours of the work week and adapting to working outside of a stale office setting.

Work environments must keep up with their IT staff’s needs and wants just like companies must keep up with the preferences of their customers. Furthermore, since customers are relying more and more on technology, “IT workers must have a broader set of skills than they’ve needed in the past”, as Michael Carlson of Xcel Energy points out. Read more here.


Tech Toys

What is it about really kooky gadgets that draw us in? The following are some of the strangest or possibly pointless we’ve seen, yet most interesting…

Talking Lips - Hands-free talking in style! Forget a blue tooth, try the white lips! This “speaker” can actually be used for hands-free conversations on a mobile phone or through voice chat sessions on a PC. And the lips actually move according to the sounds. Talk about a conversation piece…literally.


Bouncing Camera - Not so much strange as just kind of pointless, but then again, how many of us have dropped our cameras and broken them? This camera won’t break; it’ll actually work when you drop it. The bouncing cam takes a 3.0 megapixel picture as it makes contact with the ground (or wherever you throw it). Every shot will be an action shot, plus you could take some pretty uh…creative…pictures with this thing.