CST News
Where did the Christmas break get to? It was over far too quickly – buy aren’t they all? Sue and I did very little. For about the first time the Dunedin families organised Christmas and the oldies just turned up. Admittedly Sue did take some part of the meal but just so nice to be part of a family with three generations all enjoying their own company and the time together. We are so lucky both as a family and as a country. I am sure we take it all for granted at times.
After Christmas, Sue and I headed off to Christchurch up through the McKenzie country. Popped in to see a couple of friends in Twizel and stayed the night in Omarama. We did not see too many loopy drivers but the newspapers and TV tell me there are a few up that way. It is certainly different country to South Otago! A pleasant few days in Christchurch with Sue’s family and then back to work. That was the longest break I have had since leaving teaching.
The year has started well at CST with the usual post Christmas repairs to fix what the kids unfixed over the break and a couple of early sales.
Jackie had a couple of extra days break around Waitangi Day and popped up to Auckland to see Cirque du Soleil – by all accounts as amazing as the TV promos make it seem. At the same time Dave Scott whom some will remember worked here a couple of years ago, and now works for me in Dunedin, went up to see the Nines. Then in a city of 1.4 million people, Jackie and Dave met in the Albany shopping centre carpark! How can it be that two people from little old South Otago can find one another in a city of 1.4 million?
Staffing
The big news for our holiday was the appointment of Rickie Kewene to our staff. Rickie is our new technician and took up the job at the start of the year.
Rickie comes to us from Otago Polytech where he graduated last year with a Bachelor of IT. ProSouth sponsors a prize each year at Otago Poly and as luck would have it, Rickie won the ProSouth prize in 2015. Before that he has been in the hospitality industry so he is a man of many talents.
Rickie will continue to live in Dunedin and commute daily so those who want work done in Milton or Waihola should let us know so that we can organise it for Rickie to do on his way to or from work each day.
I would like to really thank Gregg for helping us out here when we were short of technical skills. It was difficult for him with a young family and two hours extra travel each day. We really appreciated the extra mile you went for our customers Gregg.
New Pet
We used to have a white cat many years ago – but not as long as this.
When To Upgrade To Windows 10
We are getting more and more people asking us if the time is right to upgrade to Windows 10. We are close to upgrading here at CST, and the guys at ProSouth upgraded last year. They are really happy with the upgrade but they are all geeks!
We are still getting the odd glitch but nothing too major. So if you want to give it a go, go for it!
Here is a short article from HP about business migration to Windows 10. It is aimed at business users but some comments are valid for home users too.
Weather
After all the great weather we have been having, I thought this was an amazing photo of a front coming through. I am not sure when the photo was taken or where it was taken but it is still pretty cool.
BYOD
In today’s jargon, BYOD stands for Bring Your Own Device which is what students are told to do at school these days. What it means is they can bring their own laptop or tablet or even a phone and connect to the school network to access the internet. This is an interesting article including comments from Steve Jobs – the late head of the Apple dynasty. Apparently he would not let his kids use iPads and this article explains why.
Amazing Photos Which Are NOT Photoshopped
I know this is a “family show” so please excuse the first one in this sequence of photos. But they are too amazing to let slip by – thank you Facebook.
Microsoft Vista
We have had a sudden rush of customers in the shop saying they are getting a message that Google Chrome running in Windows Vista is no longer being supported by Google. What this means in English is that if you use Chrome as your preferred program to browse the internet, Google are no longer providing updates for it if you are running Vista.
Vista is scheduled to lose support from Microsoft in April next year so Google are just jumping the gun a bit.
An interesting little article here.
What options do you have?
- Ignore the nag screens – fairly difficult I believe!
- Change your browser and use Internet Explorer or another product
- Upgrade Vista to another operating system – may not be possible and will be quite expensive – say $300 minimum.
- Upgrade to a new computer
- Upgrade to a refurbished computer from about $500 upwards depending on the specs you want.
Refurbished computers are a good option to save a dollar or two (and who doesn’t want to do this?). They are all ex lease and have been checked thoroughly before sale and will be three or four years of age. Most are running Windows 7 but we can upgrade this to the latest and greatest Windows 10 at no extra cost for you if you wish. Come in and see us to get the full details. You might be surprised how much you can save by going this way.
