Ferrum Technology Services Blog

Do you have a smartphone? Do you feel as though your data is secure on it? Users are relying on smartphones more and more to accomplish daily tasks. This means there is a massive amount of data traffic each day transferred to and from your device, and potentially transferred into the hands of a cybercriminal. 

Thanks to file management systems that can be digitized and stored online, filing cabinets can be considered a thing of the past. Of course, you still have to keep digital filing systems organized, but this is easier to do and more efficient than paper files. Today, we provide you with tips on how to ensure that you can keep your files in proper order.

With technologies like machine learning and artificial intelligence entering further into our daily lives, what was once science fiction is becoming fact - assisting our lives (which most would agree is better than threatening our lives). For this week’s tip, we’ll show you how to leverage machine learning in a very basic way: in the Android version of Gmail’s Smart Compose feature.

I don’t mean to gross you out, but have you ever considered how disgusting your laptop is? Studies have compared the relative cleanliness of a keyboard and a toilet seat… and unfortunately, the keyboard wasn’t the cleaner of the two. This is why it makes sense to regularly give your laptop devices a good cleaning, and why we’ve put together some tips to ensure you safely sanitize a laptop device.

Why do manufacturers and developers constantly issue updates and upgrades to their software and hardware solutions? A business’s IT solutions might seem like something you want to set up and not think about ever again, but this is simply not how the cookie crumbles. This week’s tip is dedicated to why your organization needs to have a strategy in place to approach your upgrades.

It’s no secret how useful the Google Chrome browser is to a user. What is a secret, however, is that Chrome has some added capabilities that make it even more useful than first impressions would suggest. For our Tip of the Week, we’ll review some of these capabilities so you can implement them into your daily workflows.

It seems that businesses today are obsessed with productivity, and while this isn’t a bad thing inherently, it can encourage you and your employees to pick up bad habits. Unfortunately, those who try to juggle responsibilities are often less productive than people that focus on one task and take it through to completion. Let’s discuss why this is, and how you can better, more productively make use of your time.

When a computer is new, it seems to blaze through tasks at unbelievable speeds… but this doesn’t seem to last very long at all. In short order, a computer seems to slow to an excruciating crawl. What makes this happen, and how can it be fixed? We’ll go over this below.

You would be hard-pressed to find a better-known software suite than Microsoft Office, Microsoft Word probably leading the pack in terms of name recognition. When a solution is so well-known, it can be hard to call anyone who uses it a power user. However, for this week’s tip, we’re doing a deep dive into its capabilities to take your use of Word a few steps up.

Have you ever had your Windows PC lose its Recycle Bin? This has been known to happen since the update to Windows 10, but even updates to Windows 7 and 8.1 have seen similar issues. If your Recycle Bin has pulled a Houdini, we’ll help you get it back. Read on to find out how!

The term “best practice” has been used by businesses for years to describe the optimal way of performing a particular task. However, before fully adopting them into business operations, it is important for these practices to be examined and deemed to be beneficial to an individual company’s circumstances. If they are not, a company risks much by adopting a misplaced best practice.

You might think you know all of the tricks that a mouse is capable of, but you would be wrong. Here are some of the niftiest uses possible for your mouse.

Everyone makes mistakes. This is especially true when it comes to the technology that is used by your organization every single day. For this week’s tip, here are some things to avoid when using your computer.

Windows 10 is a valuable asset for any business, but are you taking full advantage of it? We’ll discuss some of the lesser known tips and tricks that your organization can take advantage of to get more out of your business technology.

Microsoft Word is a great tool that your business may use for word processing, but it can do so much more. With the right tools, you’ll be able to take advantage of many different tricks that could change the way you see Microsoft Word. Here are four neat tips that you may not have thought of.

Google Drive is certainly a worthy cloud solution, and if you have the good fortune of using it for your organization, you know that it can offer everything from word processing to file storage options. However, there are always hidden features that can help you improve the way you use Google Drive. We’ll walk about three of the lesser known ways to use Drive that can help you better use it for your organization’s benefit.

Let’s say that you’re in the comfort of your own home working on a major project that needs to be completed before you turn in for the night. However, the moment you take out a tablet or laptop, your toddler runs up to you, curious about what you’re trying to do. This makes it rather difficult to get anything done, especially since most toddlers suffer from what’s known as the “mine” syndrome.

While online shopping is great for finding exactly what you need, you still need to remember that cybercrime is a major problem and that you need to be careful of where you plug in your financial information. Here are some best practices that can help to keep you safe this holiday season while bargain-hunting.

Have you ever tried lugging around two smartphones? It’s not as fun as it sounds, especially since having two devices means double the chance of losing one. Often times, this two-phone dilemma results from having both a work-issued phone and a personal phone. Thankfully, merging two phones is easy to do.

For the busy business owner, getting work done while traveling is a way of life. Unfortunately, working on the go can be a disaster if you don’t properly prep your technology. Here are seven guidelines to make sure your technology is ready for your big trip.

Be sure to add these suggestions to your pre-trip checklist.