TX Young CPAs Conference: Technology Update Bryan Wilton

Bryan Wilton, CPA, CITP presented an update of the current technology trends and their applicability to the accounting profession.

Bryan's presentation focused on the practical application of the current hardware and software options available. Below are a few of the items discussed:

Notebook computer options:

Sony -- Generally are priced at a premium, lightweight, and reliable

Apple -- Apple has gotten into the business notebook sector. The MacBook Air is ultraportable. These days, Apple computers can run any software that a PC can. Apple computers generally are also marketed at a premium price point.

Lenovo -- Formerly IBM. These computers have good pricing and are good quality machines for business.

HP -- Very high quality graphics, generally higher failure rate, higher priced.

Dell -- Good quality and competitive pricing. They now have some ultraportable models. Dell is begining to branch out on design and offer models other black or gray notebooks.

Laptoplogic.com is a good source of independent reviews for notebook computers.

SAAS -- Software as a service. "Cloud Computing" provides several advantages over traditional hardware and software configurations. These strengths include adaptability, reliability, increased productivity, price, back-end integration, longevity, ecosystem. System outages used to be acceptable, but they are not acceptable any more.

Broadband access is pervasive these days. Before, this was a limiting factor for SAAS, but the limitation has gone away.

SAAS Vendors:

Salesforce.com

Microsoft CRM Online

Hosted Microsoft Exchange

Oracle

SAP Business One

Online backups:

Why should you do backups online? Peace of mind, someone else is responsible, data is safe (?). The important features of online backup are around the clock support, mapped drive support, web based controls, cross platform support.

Personal online backup options:

Microsoft Skydrive offers 25gb of free storage.

Adrive.com offers 50gb of free storage.

Questions you should ask an online storage company: How long do you keep my data? How do I get my data restored?

A few online storage companies for business include:

Amerivault, Ibackup, Mozy Pro, Backupmyinfo

MOSS is Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server. This provides substantial search functionality. MOSS is a supercharged outlook that integrates VOIP, Mobile Apps, faxing, live meeting, video conferencing.