News from The IT Desk

19 December 2025

A year I think most of us would like to forget.

It seems like every year since 2020 has been a nightmare. Working hard for not much reward. Chasing tails, and we just seem to be going around and around in circles. Wake up on 1st Januray and the next thing we are celebrating Christmas again. 

The IT sphere is becoming more and more complex with how AI is starting to be used by criminals, whether it is cloning a friend or family members voice to scam you out of money, an email that appears legit or "cold calls" selling a solution that really only brings a solution to a scammers bank account. AI was supposed to make our lives easier, but a quick browse of social media and you see videos, post and blogs that have been created with an AI tool and it is becoming more and more difficult to filter out the truth from the fantasy. The agenda's people are pushing using AI and the gullibility of the majority of users is spreading disinformation and fear faster then any time in the past. Unfortunately, the way users have adapted to the technology, does not help with the awareness of the issues. Users take social media, and IT in general as gospel now, and so if the phone or pc says it is so, then it is so, no question. 

We need to have 2026 teach us not to take everything at face value, treat everything with suspicion and treat every offer as if it is a "too good to be true" offering. We need to take a step back and not accept the "news" on social media as true and binding. We need to become familier with the headings of these sites and see if we can identify what is AI, what is real and what is the truth. A classic video is the one of "the lion pulling a tourist from a safari vehicle". These incidents have not been on the news, they have not been verified on any conservation sites, but these are being sent to groups as a real and true incident. In my experience, a lion is not going to pull a human from a vehicle. If you climb out of your vehicle to and strock the pretty cat, you will probably be killed. 

The influence that AI is having on the general public now is growing exponentially and the gullibility of people is matching this growth. 

Be careful out there. 

Habe a blessed Christmas and New Year.

22 November 2025

The week that was and lessons learned

This past week has been a crazy and stressful week, and somewhere a decision needs to be made as to where the limits are on your availability as an IT support technician, used on an ad hoc, break fix solution, or on limited contact hours.

Remembering this, we work on an hourly rate, and so any hours we are onsite is chargeable, and if you have a demand for long hours, it will cost and can be expensive. A properly negotiated SLA with set hours and cost can be effective in managing the budget spent on IT, but incorrectly or outdated agreements, can lead to higher costs at month end.

IT is constantly evolving and even though it is supposed to reduce support time with AI tools and workflow tools, it can actually be more time consuming as the IT techs needs to make sure these tools are updated, working and stable. These all take time, and the more devices or staff you have, the more time it will take, leading to higher costs if the times are not correctly negotiated.

Sometimes the client forgets that the technician they use, who comes in when required and is not a full time employee, cannot deliver the support a full-time employee can deliver, a difficult problem, that can take hours to diagnose and fix, for a part time consultant can be rewarding for the technician, but expensive for the business.

If you do not have a SLA in place and the IT support costs are getting higher than budgeted for, then maybe it is time to either negotiate a SLA or renegotiate for better support.

Speak to your IT guy. IT does not have to be expensive, but your IT does need to be cared for.

30 October 2025

From the desk of Richard -IT Manager

For the last couple of years, there has been a lot of publicity surrounding the retirement of Windows 10. Windows 10 was launched on the 29th July 2015 to replace Windows 7, Vista and the notorious WIndows 8. Windows 7 replaced the brilliant stable Windows XP, which actually was around for long after its support ended, there are in fact still people using XP. The problem with that is you leave yourself vulnarable to hacks, no driver files for new hardware, and browsers dont work efficiently. 

So this brings me back to Windows 10. It is a stable platform, and despite the multiple updates every month, and the original launch news that it would be the last ever Windows flavour release, and Microsoft would only update the operating system, they have found out that actually, a full system rebuild is better, and once tested fully, more stable, until they send out updates that somehow break the system, but that is a story for another day.

As the deadline has passed, and users realise that actually, Windows 10 did not miraculously stop working, a bit like the Y2K computer scare leading up to the turn of the century, when life just continued, depressing for some, but a relief for us in corporate IT at the time, and that all the data and email etc is still accessible, Office is still working and you can still print, the panic has now subsided. Yes, there are issues, some Windows 11 users have realised that Windows 11 is resource hungry and at the very minimum they need to double their installed RAM and or replace their old mechanical harddrive with an SSD and activate a cloud based file storage solution as most SSD are still quite small compared to the traditional mechanical drives where you can easily have a 2TB drive in your laptop, the SSDs are generally around 500GB unless you can find a 1TB and pay a premium for the extra storage.

Unfortunately, if the upgrades dont work well, then a new system is needed, with the cost that comes with it. As always, retailers will try to sell "affordable" "budget friendly" machines that are usually under spec'd and you end up paying more in the long run. But for the near future, if your Windows 10 machine is working to your needs, then there is no rush to run out and buy a new machine. But my advice would be to start looking around, and saving for a new machine sooner, rather than later.

Till next time. 

28 October 2025 

From the desk of Richard -IT Manager

This has been a busy year.  Having linked up with an old friend in December of 2024, and deciding we are going to attempt to build something amazing, we have finally come to a point where we can really start building. The planning, the strategising the plan changes have been a long arduous process but, we have come to a point where we have launched a new website, which is cleaner, more informative and descriptive of our dream.

From my side, the last frew years have been a challenge in the fieid with the growth of the independent, small to medium IT support service industry. It seems like the industry is similar to the old corner cafe, there was one on nearly every corner serving either side of the street, and so it feels similar to IT, where everyone know an IT guy. 

This is also indicitive of employment practices in the wider salaried scenario, where IT technicians need to become independent contractors to try make a living, but with so many guys concentrated in areas, it becomes tough to build the business when there are a few well established support companies that have a good client base, and can get clients via  word of mouth  because their service is exemplory, and have a track record. 

Having said that, there are still clients out there that do not use a single IT company, they forget or lose a number and reach out to the first number they find on a search engine, and use that guy  once, then repeat the cycle.

With AIM (ai-mate) we want to build relationships built around service excellence, to help you as small to medium enterprise grow and achieve your dreams.