Industry analyst firm Gartner Inc. has released its Global Campus LAN Magic Quadrant  2008 - and ProCurve Networking by HP is positioned in the "Leaders" quadrant.

According to the Gartner report, "A leader has demonstrated a sustained ability to meet the changing needs for mainstream LAN switching architectures. A leader also has an ability to shape the market and maintain strong relationships with its channels and customers, and has no major gaps in the portfolio."

North Daviess High School has now become one of a half dozen schools in Indiana using what is called the new tech curriculum.

The school did a $60,000 technology upgrade over the summer and now is teaching students in a whole new way.Teachers and administrators say they see great potential in the new project-based 21st Century Learning curriculum that is being phased into the high school starting with freshmen, although some eighth graders and sophomores are in 21st Century.

The North Daviess 21st Century Learning classroom is connected to the internet with a 10 mb fiber connection provided by ENA and the internal network is powered by HP Procurve and Matrix Integration.

Mitel today announced that respected industry research firm InfoTech has confirmed its market leadership position in the U.S. for IP Telephony (IPT) for small businesses.

According to the report titled "InfoTrack for Unified Communications: 2008 SMB Market Analysis" (IUC), Mitel captured 17.2 percent of the 2007 SMB IP telephony market, well ahead of major competitors like Cisco, Avaya and Nortel. Following its merger with InterTel in 2007, Mitel gained 8.5 percent of market share beating its closest competitor NEC by 3.4 percent. InfoTech defines the SMB market as Small Businesses (SB) with two to 100 employees and Medium Businesses (MB) with 101 to 500 employees.

"We're very excited to be acknowledged again as the SMB leader", noted Rick Dell, president of sales for Mitel U.S. "The strength of the Mitel brand in the SMB market is well known. With a growing portfolio and expanding channels to market, we continue to increase our market footprint and reinforce our position as the trusted provider of unified communications for growing businesses across the United States."

If you love mobile computing, but you don't love hauling the extra weight of some full-featured notebooks, HP is about to lighten your load. HP just introduced three ultra-portable notebook computers, including a three-pound⁽¹⁾ EliteBook, the smallest and lightest HP notebook with a built-in optical drive.With these new Ultra-Light Business Notebook PCs, you can have the power, portability and flexible mobile features you need - without putting a heavy burden on your shoulders or your budget.

As an IP Telephony Solutions Architect, I'm often asked:  "What brand of telephone system should I buy?"

My immediate answer is; "Let's do our homework and figure that out."

I think that "homework" is the key here.  In reality, the "homework" is much more important than the logo on the front of a phone or any other network component.  It's also the most difficult phase of a telephony project.  In the IP Telephony world we rely on so much more than the telephone or phone system itself.  The business applications, business process, utilization, cabling, and network foundation are all key to a rewarding Telephony solution. The "homework" determines whether or not you're going to be happy or totally frustrated with the investment or lack thereof.

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