Microsoft services

Windows 7

Windows 7 is the latest Windows operating system from Microsoft. It is a big improvement on XP and has a number of improvements on Vista.

Have a look at some of the exciting new features here.

Upgrading to Windows 7

• Note that you cannot upgrade directly from XP, you will need to backup your system and install from fresh, or get someone to do it for you
• You have to install Windows 7 on an NTFS file system - if you check your C drive properties and it says "FAT32" you will need to address that when you install
• Windows 7 has a simple-to-use backup function, so once you've upgraded consider a backup strategy if you don't have one already
• If you have applications that will not run in Windows 7 that's not a problem, as an "XP Compatibility mode" is available that will run them as if you were still running XP; note however that this requires additional system resources (namely 2Gb RAM)

Main system requirements for Windows 7 are a 1GHz processor, with 1Gb RAM.

To check how easy an upgrade might be use Microsoft's upgrade advisor

Microsoft Office training

I have been working on Word since it was Word for DOS (sadly), so can generally help with any MS Office issues, and can provide training on a 1:1 or on site classroom. Maximum attendees should be 8 I would suggest.

If you're upgrading from an older version of Office to 2007 you may need a quick overview of where to find things on the new ribbon bars.

If you haven't upgraded yet you should consider doing so, as support for the older versions may dwindle.

Learning more about some of the fancy stuff, like shortcuts, mail merge and even cut/paste options can sometimes make using office much quicker.

Need to communicate better?

Perhaps there are more people in your office now and working together is more difficult.

Having a central server can make life a whole lot easier, having a central location where documents and images are stored; this could be just an old PC, or consider a Windows Small Business Server.

If you do have a Windows Server of any type, do you know that you have Sharepoint available - for free - to build your own intranet? I can set this up for you so that you can use it.

Alternatively consider the online solutions - Microsoft have office-type solutions online for quite a reasonable price that you can share wherever you are.