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Your day has turned into nothing but trouble. Email is going
nowhere. Your window to the Internet has been boarded up. As
far as your computer knows, that contract you’ve worked on for
two weeks never existed. Suddenly the day is all about file
servers, backups, and routers, and you don’t know where the
problem lies. Is your business exposed to this kind of
frustration?
A Maintenance Contract is the
Answer Your computer systems require
maintenance and troubleshooting over the course of a year.
Aging components, power outages, hardware failures, and simple
human errors often result in loss of data and productivity.
A maintenance agreement can minimize the frustration. One of
the region’s largest computer service providers, Shiloh
Service offers solutions geared to the needs of your business.
“Some customers hesitate at the expense of a maintenance
agreement,” says Debbie Jadlocki, an account representative
for Shiloh Service. “They feel it’s cheaper to handle
emergencies as they come.”
When companies examine the big picture, averaging their “as
needed” computer maintenance costs over a five-year period, it
becomes obvious where the real costs lie. “Comparing is an eye
opening experience,” Debbie continues. “We have a lot of new
customers because they took the time to compare.”
Shiloh assists businesses by helping identify critical system
components. You know the functions of your business where
downtime means an ulcer and a headache rolled into one. Let
the experts at Shiloh translate that knowledge into a sensible
maintenance plan, one guaranteeing quick, reliable response
time as well as annual preventative maintenance and
diagnostics. Avoiding Unexpected Costs
With over thirty years experience, Shiloh provides a
comprehensive service, including all parts, labor, and travel.
Our experienced technicians can restore the operating system
on a stricken computer and retrieve backup information
quickly. But unexpected costs arise when your company’s
business processes and your computer maintenance agreement are
out of synch.
Situations where the file server is covered, but critical data
was lost on an uncovered machine, or the backup system went
unused, or virus protection was never updated result in
unanticipated and uncovered costs. Making
Maintenance Contracts Effective for You The
veteran account representatives at Shiloh can help you bring
your business processes and computer maintenance plan back
into harmony, resulting in a reliable and cost-effective
situation. They will recommend software and hardware solutions
to the most common problems and to the special needs of your
business. (See “Evaluating Your Computer Systems”)
Shiloh Service Solutions Imagine a busy
Thursday afternoon. Two check runs are in process: payroll and
payables. Suddenly the printer spews out an all too familiar
set of “Egyptian hieroglyphics.” After half an hour of
frustration, you finally call Shiloh Service. The maintenance
contract on your printer and computer is about to pay off.
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By remotely dialing into your computer on
your network, Shiloh quickly identifies the problem as a
corrupt printer driver. The Shiloh Service technician
reinstalls the correct driver and has you reboot your
computer. You’re off and running again! Your employees and
vendors are going to be very happy.
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A Shiloh technician arrives on the scene and
in minutes determines that the printer needs a part, one that
is on back order for the next two weeks. A loaner printer is
installed for your use over the next two weeks while your
printer is repaired.
Your big new mailing is scheduled to go out
this week, but the server keeps crashing. The machine is fine,
but your database has overgrown the server’s hard drive. The
expense of a new server is impossible right now, but so is the
situation. You call Shiloh Service, knowing your account
representative can find a solution to fit your budget.
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Instead of another server, your Shiloh rep
recommends a storage area network (SAN) system. Low
maintenance, plug it in and go, no need to configure: these
devices place data storage and management on a hard disk with
its own network address. Your server overload is solved, and
at a reasonable price. SANs increase network speed and
efficiency, support disk mirroring, backup and restore,
archiving and retrieving data, and migration and sharing of
data.
A critical machine has gone down and you’ve
lost important data. Your back up system of floppies and CDs
is inadequate at best; still, you hesitate when faced with the
alternative of expensive tape back up systems. A call to
Shiloh Service provides the answer.
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Instead of expensive tape back ups, your
Shiloh account representative recommends investing in some
removable hard drives and Symantec’s Ghost. With Ghost, the
images of up to 5 machines can be made on a single hard drive
(of the proper size), and the removable media rotated off-site
for maximum protection. Best of all, your Shiloh technicians
create a batch file, automating the process for ease of use.
Symantec’s Ghost is the perfect backup solution for small
peer-to-peer networks.
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Larger corporations like Ghost too. It can
remotely clone, deploy, configure, back up, restore and
distribute software specific images to network and mobile PCs.
The possibilities are endless. Each
situation brings its own challenges, not the least of which is
fitting the right solution to the available budget. Help is
only a phone call away, where Shiloh’s experienced and
friendly staff is ready to find the right maintenance plan for
you, and to help bring your business processes into harmony
with it.
Effectively managed, maintenance agreements
can reduce or eliminate unexpected costs, making those
“nothing but trouble” days a thing of the past. |
