Stories by Tom Henderson

Encrypted solid state drives protect laptop data

Vendors are touting solid state replacement drives as a way to protect corporate data in the event of a laptop being lost or stolen, and to boost performance at the same time.

First look: Windows 8 breaks new ground

The first public beta for Windows 8 is expected to be released in February, but we've been testing pre-beta code in our lab. Our overall impression is that Windows 8 represents an aggressive effort by Microsoft to deliver a single OS that runs just about everywhere and takes on all of Microsoft's key rivals.

How We Tested Solid State Drives

We used two identical Lenovo T520 notebooks, that use an Intel i5 chipset, as our test bed. We used a network boot to load a copy of Windows 7 onto the notebook after we entered HDD Master and User passwords onto each drive and formatted them for NTFS.

Cloud activity to explode in 2012

In testing cloud computing services and observing the growth of cloud activities, we've noticed that there are distinct phases that organizations go through in adopting cloud.

Mint is fun, client-focused Linux distro

When Ubuntu decided last year to abruptly replace the familiar Gnome UI with its own Unity interface, many users were upset. And according to the latest numbers from DistroWatch, Linux Mint has been the major beneficiary, so we decided to test Linux Mint 12.

Cloud activity to explode in 2012

In testing cloud computing services and observing the growth of cloud activities, we've noticed that there are distinct phases that organizations go through in adopting cloud.

Ubuntu targets smartphones, clouds

Ubuntu 11.10 has some jagged edges and documentation isn't easy to locate, but Canonical is certainly dreaming big with this latest update, dubbed Oneiric (dreamy) Ocelot.

4 valuable additions to your cloud security toolkit

If you ask IT execs why they're hesitant about moving to the public cloud, security comes up at the top of the list. But security vendors are responding to these concerns with a raft of new products. Here are four interesting cloud security tools that we tested.

Windows Server 8 first looks

Microsoft's proposed Server Manager for Windows 8 Server Editions helps explain a lot of what Microsoft proposes in Windows Server 8: Ease and flexibility.

vSphere5 sets the virtualization bar

VSphere 5.0, the latest iteration of VMware's "Cloud Operating System," boasts a wealth of updates, including new tools to manage fleets of VMs, and vast tiers of virtualized, vMotion-enabled storage links. (See "VMware makes cloud jumping easy".)

Will cloud computing make traditional vendor relationships obsolete?

Network World has conducted multiple tests of cloud-based services over the past year, and our overarching conclusion is that shifting compute processes to the cloud can help companies save money and become more flexible.

Microsoft delivers enterprise backup tool

Microsoft's flagship backup and archiving software, Data Protection Manager, has come a long way since we first tested it in 2005.

5 things we love/hate about Novell's SUSE Studio

Users might have a love/hate relationship with Novell's SUSE Studio. Here are five things we love and five things we disliked about the product.

1

NComputing X550: Low-cost, simple, effective

The X550 is a genuine old-fashioned terminal server with a twist. One or two PCIe ports are needed in a server box to host NComputing's Ethernet boards. A small, smartphone-sized box called the XD2 has speaker, Ethernet, PS/2-style mouse and keyboard jacks and a VGA jack. Two PCIe cards yields 10 machines, and the 11th is the host computer itself. The host machine can run Windows XP, 2003 Server or 2008 Server editions.

Pano Logic: Fast, easy, VMware-based

Pano Logic's Pano Cube is a very small 'designer'-looking cube containing three USB jacks, VGA and audio/mic jacks. It ostensibly has no CPU or memory/storage inside, permitting it to be used strictly as a KVM+ access device. Pano Logic also makes a USB dongle called Pano Remote for Windows-based machines that logs them onto a VM as well, but we couldn't find any use for it. Pano Remote does have the ability to constrain data transfer between a host and client PC, including print data, but this was not extensively tested.