Blog — Page 2

August 2017 Newsletter

August 5, 2017 By Rob Marlowe

Welcome to our August Newsletter

School will be starting in just a couple of weeks. There are some computer items included in this year’s School Sales Tax Holiday, so keep us in mind when you go shopping for school stuff.

NEWS FROM THE SHOP

We just picked up some cute little systems for a school client of ours. They are absolutely adorable and are little larger than a book. They come with Windows 7 Pro and they can be upgraded to Windows 10 by ordering a media kit from the manufacturer. Interested? They are just $399.95 plus a video adapter if you don’t have a displayport capable monitor.

You may have seen news reports about the fact that Kaspersky Labs is a Russian company. If you’ve been using Kaspersky’s AV solution and want something from a different company, please give us a call.

END OF SUMMER STUFF

Keep an eye on the Rec Center facebook page for lots of exciting stuff for you and the kids (or grandkids) to do this month.

We hope you found this newsletter to be informative. It’s our way of keeping you posted on the happenings at our shop.

Thanks for your business!

Best regards,

Rob Marlowe
Gulfcoast Networking, Inc.
6335 Grand Blvd
New Port Richey, FL 34652

727-847-2424

(We have used our best efforts in collecting and preparing the information published herein. However, we do not assume, and hereby disclaim, any and all liability for any loss or damage caused by errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions resulted from negligence, accident, or other causes.)

July Newsletter

July 9, 2017 By Rob Marlowe

Welcome to our July Newsletter

It’s summer so we are going to keep this short.

NEWS FROM THE SHOP

We got our hands on one of the latest generation i7 NUCs a couple of weeks ago. These little 4×4″ screamers are amazing. We’ve only managed to get a pair of 35″ monitors running with it. The specs say that we ought to be able to drive three high resolution monitors with it, if we use the right video cables. We shall see.

MALWARE

New and nasty malware attacks have spread all over the world during the past month or so. Protect yourself by keeping your computer up to date on its Windows Updates and use a quality anti-malware program on your computer.

There are a number of excellent Anti-malware programs on the market. We offer Avira products for our consumer clients and AVG managed solutions for our corporate clients. Some of the free anti-malware programs are good, but you generally get what you pay for, with the paid versions being more comprehensive in their protection, updated more regularly, and simply better that the typical free ones.

BATTERY BACKUPS

If you happen to have Frontier FIOS, you’ve got a battery inside the FIOS box. It will eventually go bad, emitting a rather annoying beep every several minutes. When this happens, it is time to call Frontier and tell them that their box needs attention.

We’ve got one at home because we used to have FIOS. It took me a bit of looking to figure out that, of all the battery backups we’ve got, it was the FIOS battery that had gone dead.

QUESTIONS?

Feel free to give us a call if you have any questions about your computer. We’ll be glad to try to answer them. Our number is 727-847-2424.

We hope you found this newsletter to be informative. It’s our way of keeping you posted on the happenings at our shop.

Thanks for your business!

Best regards,

Rob Marlowe
Gulfcoast Networking, Inc.
6335 Grand Blvd
New Port Richey, FL 34652

727-847-2424

June 2017 Newsletter

June 1, 2017 By Rob Marlowe

Welcome to our June Newsletter.

NEWS FROM THE SHOP

We continue to hear from folks who get scammed by people calling “from Microsoft” or making the mistake of calling a phone number that pops up on their screen. The scammers can be quite convincing, but don’t fall for their tricks and let them into your computer.

If you want support you can trust, feel free to sign up for one of our Safe Computing Packages. That way, you can give us a call any time you have a question and we can fix things for you.

COMPUTER TUNEUP

Included with our Safe Computing Packages, but also available separately, is an in-shop multi-check of your computer. June is typically a very quiet time in the shop, so give us a call at 727-847-2424 for an appointment and we should be able to get your machine in and back out quickly.

SPECIAL ORDERS

We can special order thousands of different computer items. It is not unusual for us to be able to beat the prices in the big box stores. If you’ve got something you would like to get, let us price it for you.

ALL AROUND TOWN

There are quite a few things going on around New Port Richey these days. We’ve got copy’s of the New Port Richey Parks & Recreation guide. In addition to giving you all the info you might want about our Recreation and Aquatic Center, it includes information on a number of free events in the park over the next few months. Feel free to drop by and pick up a copy.

The next city cleanup day is June 3rd. There will be a Summer Concert, “Surf’s Up Tour, Beach Boys Tribute” Saturday evening.

SUMMER STORM SEASON

The summer thunderstorm season should get cranked up later this month. It is important to turn your computer off if you aren’t using it and unplug it if you are nearby when a severe electrical storm rolls through. Be sure to unplug the network cable that comes from your cable modem or router too! It is not unusual to see damaging surges come in through the Internet connection.

We hope you found this newsletter to be informative. It’s our way of keeping you posted on the happenings at our shop.

Thanks for your business!

Best regards,

Rob Marlowe
Gulfcoast Networking, Inc.
6335 Grand Blvd
New Port Richey, FL 34652

727-847-2424

An Example of a Phishing E-Mail

February 21, 2017 By Rob Marlowe

This is an example of a “phishing” email that is designed to trick you into giving the bad guys your login credentials so that they can empty your bank account. In the real email, if you clicked on the “login” button, it would have taken you to a server in Russia controlled by the thieves.

We see these type emails on a daily basis.

Even worse are similar emails that, if you click on the link, will install malware that may compromise your computer, spew malware to all of your friends, encrypt all of your data, or worse.

Mouse over any link you might be tempted to click on to see where it actually goes. If it doesn’t go where you expect, DO NOT click on it.

Likewise, DO NOT open attachments sent to you from unknown sources and don’t open attachments from people you know if you are not expecting them to send you something. Automatically delete any emails that come from friends, but have an email address not matching their name.

Better safe than sorry.

It is worth pointing out that USAA didn’t send the email. It didn’t go out from their servers. They are just as much a victim of the scammers as anyone else. We’ve seen similar emails purporting to come from all of the major banks.

February 2017 Newsletter

February 14, 2017 By Rob Marlowe

Welcome to our February 2017 Newsletter

NEWS FROM THE SHOP

If you’ve been thinking about a new computer, come see us. We’ve got access to a number of different name brand systems and we also build custom systems.

Nice basic systems can be had in the $500 range and really super systems will generally fall in the $1000-1200 range.

MICROSOFT SUPPORT

I have lost track of the number of times I’ve heard of someone getting a call from “Microsoft” or seeing a popup on their screen telling them to call an 800 number to deal with an infected computer. These are almost ALWAYS scams designed to separate you from your money. If you let the scammers into your computer, they will typically lock things up until you pay them some outrageous amount of money to fix your computer.

We offer Safe Computing Packages for our residential clients. For a single fixed price each year, we’ll install anti-malware software on your computer and be just a phone call away so you can call US when you get one of those phone calls or popups. Trust me, any of our Safe Computing packages will be less expensive thanpaying the scammers to get your control of your computer back.

ALL THINGS GEEK

I’m going to depart from pure computer / Internet stuff this month and talk about something else I’ve been watching. Given that I’m both a geek and a car nut, the topic shouldn’t surprise anyone:

One of the more interesting tech developments over the past few years is the way that electric vehicle (EV) sales have started to take off. It used to be that someone driving a hybrid or an EV could easily be classified as a “tree hugger”. That isn’t the case anymore. People looking for cars that are economical to operate are starting to give EVs and hybrids a closer look. Toyota brought hybrids to the mainstream with their line of Prius models. Other car companies have followed suit with a range of hybrids to suit just about any need.

Although only about 1% of all cars sold currently are EVs or Plug-In Hybrids, with January’s sales being 59% over January 2016 numbers, things won’t stay that way for long. Cars that you plug in are already at the point where they are less expensive to operate than conventional gasoline powered cars. With battery prices continuing to decline, electric cars will become a very attractive option.

The 2017 Chevy Bolt, which won’t arrive here in Florida until mid-summer, has been named the Motor Week Car of the Year. With a 230+ mile range, it will fill the needs of most people. It is the first mass market pure EV that would work as a daily driver for me. Up until now, the range of affordable EVs has been too low to cover my periodic drives around the Tampa Bay area. A 70 mile range doesn’t cover my round trips to St. Pete or Tampa. A 200+ mile range covers it with range to spare.

Plug-In Hybrids are also very attractive. The second generation Chevy Volt uses regular gas instead of premium and promises to have a 1000 mile range between fillups. I can believe Chevy’s range claim. My son’s first generation Prius Plug-In, which a much shorter pure EV range, is easily capable of 700 plus miles between fillups. The biggest advantage of a plug-in hybrid over a pure EV is that you get the best of both worlds: Economical EV power around town and no limit on how far you can drive on a road trip. My son drove his Prius Plug-In all the way from California to Florida!

Most folks plug their cars in at home overnight to recharge. Public charging stations are popping up around the Tampa Bay area and they will make it easier to drive around without burning dead dinosaurs. We’ve got a handful of charging stations around town now and I expect that number to grow.

Where will this all go? My prediction is that we are looking at a sea change in cars similar to what we saw with the Internet over the last 20 years or so. Regardless of what we, or our leaders, believe about global warming, the economic benefits associated with electric vehicles will drive the sales growth of these vehicles.

We hope you found this newsletter to be informative. It’s our way of keeping you posted on the happenings at our shop.

Thanks for your business!

Best regards,

Rob Marlowe
Gulfcoast Networking, Inc.
6335 Grand Blvd
New Port Richey, FL 34652

727-847-2424

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