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10 Best IT Products Of 2006
digihome writes "CRN.com chooses the ten best new products of 2006, including the best development tools, server, notebook and storage device. Some of the choices may surprise you ... such as their choice for operating system of the year." From the article: "With Windows Vista, Microsoft has refreshed the user desktop experience. While debate rages over whether the five-year wait was worth it, the truth is Vista is pretty much the only game in town. One may question whether Vista should be bestowed with Product of the Year recognition in the operating system category. But the product unquestionably brings new features and capabilities to solution providers that in turn promise new revenue generation dialogues with end users."
well, ... technically the version on the list is already shipped. This means they could put the consumer version on the list NEXT year...
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
Nice, they put them on ten pages...filled with wonderful ads and other Christmas goodies.
Anyways, here's the top ten, Karma Whore, Beeeeatch!
WEB DEVELOPMENT TOOL
DataDirect Technologies Stylus Studio 2007
SECURITY SOFTWARE
Astaro Security Gateway
NETWORKING HARDWARE
Server Partners File Engine
STORAGE
Intel SS4000-E
APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT TOOL
Compuware DevPartner 8.0
IMAGING
Minolta Magicolor 7450
NOTEBOOK
Hewlett-Packard Compaq NC6400
APPLICATION SOFTWARE
Microsoft Exchange 2007
OPERATING SYSTEM
Microsoft Vista Enterprise Edition
SERVER
SuperServer 5015M-MR
the truth is Vista is pretty much the only game in town
If I still cared I'd throw a fit at that comment. Instead I'll happily continue to use Ubuntu on my laptop and OSX on my Desktop. Vista who?
This is a VAR mag, i.e. for resellers.
Every "best product" description includes suggested pricing, margin and contact details.
Of course in that respect Vista is THE product for 2007.
From their Media Kit page:
Mission Statement
CRN drives sales by empowering VARs and technology integrators with the vital news and technology information they need to generate demand and grow revenue. CRN is the newspaper of record for the channel. For 24 years, VARs, Solution Providers, technology integrators and IT consultants have turned to CRN first each week for immediate and actionable information.
This has nothing to do with "best of breed" or anything like that. It's purely about MAXIMIZING REVENUE by doing as little as possible.
This guy's the limit!
I want my 5 minutes back!!! Sheesh.
Sig? - yeah, whatever.
Would you care to check my post history first and see that I generally trash the people that trash talk MS?
But then, I generally militate against knee-jerk, and the jerks they are attached to, on either side of that childish argument. Welcome to the list.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
nothing there was glamorous or would likely make any REAL IT person's top 50 list let alone top 10. .NET programming IDE for example...
IT shouldn't give a damn about a
and Vista...you can bet your sweet @$$ IT folk are NOT putting that in their top 10 list!
"Just Smile and Nod." --Huck
WEB DEVELOPMENT TOOL
DataDirect Technologies Stylus Studio 2007
"Stylus Studio 2007 XML Enterprise Suite is priced at $795. Oak Park, Calif.-based DataDirect offers average margins between 10 percent and 35 percent. Seasonal spifs also are offered."
SECURITY SOFTWARE
Astaro Security Gateway
"Pricing is based on active users and concurrent connections. Configurations for as few as 10 users to unlimited users and connections are available. Suggested pricing for a sample configuration allowing 250 active users and 512,000 connections, including subscriptions and one year of maintenance, is $11,885."
NETWORKING HARDWARE
Server Partners File Engine
"Prices start at $235 per month for a unit containing two mirrored 120-Gbyte hard drives. The monthly fee covers installation, integration, monitoring and maintenance. Updates are performed automatically as needed. Configurations with larger capacities are available at a higher price. A built-in double-layer DVD burner lets users put up to 18 Gbytes of backup files on removable media from an easy-to-use push-button interface. To prevent user tampering, no mouse, keyboard or monitor come with the appliance."
STORAGE
Intel SS4000-E
"The SS4000-E is available as a barebones unit with no hard drives for $550. That's a beautiful thing for system builders that want to configure it themselves. It's also available preconfigured with four 500-Gbyte hard drives for $2,000."
APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT TOOL
Compuware DevPartner 8.0
???
IMAGING
Minolta Magicolor 7450
~$2.5K - Froogle
NOTEBOOK
Hewlett-Packard Compaq NC6400
"Solution providers have a dizzying array of options for configuring a unique notebook for their customers. Specifically, the basic nc6400 (en362UT) starts at $1,199 and comes with an Intel T550 processor, 512 Mbytes of RAM and a 60-Gbyte hard disk. Meanwhile, the higher-end model nc6400 (RA264AT) retails for $1,549 and comes with an Intel T2400 processor, 1 Gbyte of RAM and a 60-Gbyte hard disk. All models feature a three-year warranty and weigh as little as 5 pounds."
APPLICATION SOFTWARE
Microsoft Exchange 2007
"Pricing for server licenses and standard Client Access Licenses is the same as Exchange 2003, but Exchange 2007 introduces the Enterprise Client Access License, which includes Software Assurance. The price for Exchange Enterprise is $3,999 and the Client Access License is $67, which includes calendaring, mobile device access and basic antispam."
OPERATING SYSTEM
Microsoft Vista Enterprise Edition
???
SERVER
SuperServer 5015M-MR
"The SuperServer 5015M-MR has an expansion slot that supports PCI and PCI-X cards, and it supports PCI-Express x8 cards using an optional riser board. It only has one 3.5-inch hard drive bay but will accept up to 8 Gbytes of memory. The server is optimized for and sized right for security appliances such as firewalls and VPNs. Supermicro sells this server as a barebones white-box unit for only $600, and fully configured units are available from distributors. A typical configuration would contain a 3.2GHz dual-core Pentium D processor, 4 Gbytes of memory and a 300-Gbyte SATA hard drive, all for less than $1,500."
Bingo! This publication is aimed at people who resell technology products. That means that for a product to be of interest to them, it has to be a recognizable brand that can be resold at a markup. Open-source software or whitebox PCs are The Enemy to these people.
I recall reading a best-of/worst-of list by either CRM on a similar publication. What I remember was that all of the best-of items had recognizable brands, referred to by name: Apple notebooks, Palm PDAs, etc. The worst-of items, though, were all vague, wishy-washy categories like "white-box PCs". The real "message" of the article was that the only good stuff is name-brand stuff.
(Sorry, I can't recall the citation, so consider this an unsupported anecdote.)
And yet this article from the same website concludes that Vista is in fact not the only game in town.
Security Software: OpenBSD 3.9. I upgraded from 3.5 this year without too much effort. Guess what? It still works, and it's still the most secure OS on the planet. Cost: $0.
:( )
:P Cost: $0.
Web Development Tool: Eclipse+Webtools. Webtools has incorporated the best features from JBoss-IDE and combined them with their already tres cool Webtools. Now I can get a vendor-neutral Web Development Tool whose features match or exceed anything out there. Cost: $0.
Application Software: Evolution 2.2. All of the features that everyone "needs" in Microsoft Outlook, as well as Junk Mail filtering based on SpamAssassin. Oh, it also works with Microsoft Exchange servers thanks to the Novell Evolution-Exchange adaptor. Cost: $0. (Firefox 2.0 takes up too much RAM
Network Hardware: The RT2500 wireless chip. Open Source drivers, works with *BSD and pretty much any modern Linux distro. Allows for custom-built WAPs -- w00t! Cost: $100
Server Hardware: Whatever I manage to put together with the bits lying around my basement. It'll be running Linux, so it's still faster than a new Vista machine
I missed a couple, but I'm sure somebody can finish the list. I guess I'm a cheapskate this year -- I won't be spending anything on my geek friends...
mandelbr0t
"Please describe the scientific nature of the 'whammy'" - Agent Scully
That didn't stop them from picking a product that won't be generally released until NEXT year...
...and they've sold what, two whole copies of Vista Enterprise so far?