Archives for April 2024

Happy Friday! We hope you had a wonderful week and have a weekend full of adventures ahead of you. If you have plans, we’d love to hear about them!

In This Issue: Uber Lost & Found | Hi-Speed USB 2.0 Cable | What Is a Network Fabric? | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Uber Lost & Found

Happy Friday, my fellow Uber adventurers!

This week, I stumbled upon something quite amusing: Uber’s lost-and-found list. As you can imagine, it’s a collection of the usual suspects: clothing, luggage, phones, and wallets.

Believe it or not, the list is a treasure trove of the unexpected. I mean, who leaves behind a toupee or a jar of spiders? It’s like a real-life game of ‘What’s in the Uber?’ Here are a few other things that surprised me:
burrito steamer (these things aren’t small!)
WWE championship belt
garden fence
Once, I was this close to losing my phone in an Uber. I can’t even imagine the panic if it had been left behind. Thankfully, I caught it just in time before the driver zoomed off. Losing my phone would have created a disruptive situation! Has anything like this ever happened to you?

Wishing you all a fantastic weekend filled with relaxation and fun!

Chris

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Product Spotlights & Updates

Purchasing quality cables and connections is a must to ensure your projects are successful. With the Hi-Speed USB 2.0 Cable, A Male to B Male Cable, you can connect two USB A female-style ports. It’s important to note that these cables are not intended to connect two host computers or a computer to a hub.

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Learning Center Article – What Is a Network Fabric?

Modern networking is complicated. It’s challenging enough that you have Wi-Fi routers that can handle multiple hundreds of devices, the Internet of Things putting even more devices into a group, and the sheer magnitude of data centers and high-speed networking.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Wayfair is opening its first physical store next month in suburban Chicago. The 150,000-square foot large-format store is located in Edens Plaza in Wilmette, Illinois, and will open its doors on May 23.
• This year, Fridays will sound much more like, “Fries? Yay!” On April 17, Wendy’s announced customers can score any size of the chain’s fries with Friday purchases for the remainder of 2024. The deal launches April 19 and applies to orders made on the Wendy’s app.
• The average rate on the popular 30-year fixed mortgage sits around 7.5%, the highest level since mid-November of last year.
• Tesla has issued a voluntary recall for 3,878 of its angular, metal Cybertruck vehicles. The recall is to repair the “trapped pedal” issue seen in a viral TikTok video by Cybertruck owner Jose Martinez.

Happy Thursday & Happy National Exercise Day! Today offers inspiration to try new ways of becoming fit and healthy. What’s your favorite way to exercise?

In This Issue: This or That? | DisplayPort Cable 6 Foot | Top 5 Causes of Fiber Optic Failure | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – This or That?

Happy Thursday! Let’s play a game of this or that today. Below you’ll find a few items that we’d love your feedback on to know which you may prefer. We look forward to your thoughts!

Coffee Mugs – Regular Style vs. Camping Style

Tumblers – Straw or No Straw

Sticky Notes or Notepads

YoYo or Fidget Spinner

Thanks for playing! Maybe you’ll see some of these things make a grand appearance in your next order. Have a great rest of your week!

The CK Team

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Product Spotlights & Updates

DisplayPort cables are used to connect your devices to a monitor. Primarily used for connecting your monitor to your PC, this cable will provide high performance based on updated signal and protocol technology.

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Learning Center Article – Top 5 Causes of Fiber Optic Failure

Fiber optic networks are the best in the business — when they work. When they don’t work, they are expensive sources of frustration.

As always, the best defense is a good offense, and you can prevent the most common sources of fiber optic failure when you simply know what they are and what causes them. So, here’s a short list of the top five causes of fiber optic failure to get you going.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Comcast is launching a prepaid and month-to-month internet and phone plan program called NOW.
• Amazon is offering its smart grocery carts to third-party retailers.
• NASA has shared the timeline for when the $10,000 quadrillion asteroid will be brought down to our planet. Last year, the space agency announced that it was going to set off for the faraway asteroid named 16 Psyche, which is thought to contain precious metals, including gold, iron and nickel, worth an eye-watering amount.
• The Ingenuity Mars helicopter team convened one last time on Tuesday (April 16) to oversee a transmission from the little rotorcraft, the first robot ever to explore the skies of a world beyond Earth.

Happy Wednesday! We’ve made it to the middle of the week. We hope your to-do list is mostly checked off and you’re looking forward to the weekend.

In This Issue: Loyal & Bold | HP ProLiant DL360 Generation 10 Rackmount Server | Understanding Server CPU Specs | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Loyal & Bold

Happy Wednesday! I hope you’re having a great week so far.

This weekend was ever so sweet. We went back to our Alma Mater this weekend and it was so much fun. It was such a full-circle moment for us. My husband and I met there, got engaged there, and have so many fun memories there and we got to take our little one back with us. My heart was exploding the entire time.

I really could go on and on about our time and share all of the sweet memories and places we got to go back and visit. It was ever so sweet and even sweeter that we had friends fly in and reminisce with us. Do you have sweet memories of your Alma Mater? Would love to hear about them!

Ashley

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Product Spotlights & Updates

When your network needs a secure, performance-driven, dense server then the HPE ProLiant DL360 Gen10 Series is the place to turn! These powerful 2-socket servers feature Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors as well as DDR4 memory for an ideal combination of compute power and storage. These servers deliver the security, agility, and flexibility you need in your network.

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Learning Center Article – Understanding Server CPU Specs

Servers are essential for so many business applications these days. If you rely on your servers for anything, then you tend to rely on them for everything.

When you’re shopping for servers (or looking to upgrade your hardware), you’re going to have to compare a lot of different specifications, and one of the most important components to analyze is the central processing unit (CPU).

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Less than eight years after introducing the Snowmobile at its Reinvent conference in Las Vegas, Amazon has taken the 18-wheeler out of service.
• Eli Lilly said its highly popular weight loss drug Zepbound showed the potential to treat patients with the most common sleep-related breathing disorder in two late-stage clinical trials.
• Red Lobster is reportedly considering filing for bankruptcy to relieve financial pressures that have weighed on the company.
• For the second year in a row, Chipotle is offering a buy one, get one free deal to hockey fans if you wear a hockey jersey in-store on Monday, April 22, 2024.

Happy Tuesday! We hope you’re having a great week and settling back into the groove after spring break season. What trip do you have planned next?

In This Issue: A Weekend of Hiking…& SNOW! | Kendall Howard Small Form Factor CPU Wall Mount Shelf | Understanding Indoor Fiber Optic Cable Color Schemes | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – A Weekend of Hiking…& SNOW!

Good Morning & Happy Tuesday! Hope everyone is off to a great start this week!

I had a fantastic weekend exploring North Carolina. On Friday we headed up to Boone, NC to enjoy a weekend of hiking! The weather was extremely windy but beautiful the entire drive up, but late Friday afternoon it started to get overcast and cloudy.

After getting settled in at the cabin, we decided to head to Blowing Rock, NC to hike the Rough Ridge Overlook Trail. By the time we got there, we had driven into rain that soon turned to SNOW. We couldn’t believe it. We decided to still check out the hike which was a very intense experience given the snow and the extremely high winds. We couldn’t see a thing, but it was still fun!

On Saturday we hiked Mount Mitchell which is the highest peak east of the Mississippi. Multiple trails lead to the top (in fact, you can actually drive to the top) but we chose to hike in from Black Mountain Campground which AllTrails said was an 11.2 mile hike. It’s known for giving incorrect distances and we ended up clocking 13.1 miles and 4200 feet of elevation gain!

We were all pretty tired by the time we got to the top! Another unexpected surprise was that the top of the mountain was covered in snow. It was absolutely beautiful and we really enjoyed it, although we were way underprepared for the weather! We never considered snow when packing for the trip! It was truly a wonderful weekend and I’m glad we got to check a bucket list hike off of our list!

Have you been to Mount Mitchell? I highly recommend it if you’re ever in the area!

Rebecca

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Product Spotlights & Updates

Kendall Howard’s Small-Form-Factor Wall Mount CPU Brackets are designed to get the computer off the floor and the desktop. The brackets make it easy to secure and mount any small-form-factor PC to the wall or side of the desk. The velcro strap secures the PC to the bracket. Everyone needs a CPU bracket to protect their PC.

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Learning Center Article – Understanding Indoor Fiber Optic Cable Color Schemes

Fiber optics are common in many networks, and they’re essential to provide enough bandwidth and capability in modern digital communication. If you work in networking, you have to learn at least the basics of fiber optics.

To start today’s lesson, we can remember that fiber optics come in two modes: single and multi. Single-mode fiber does better with very long-distance communication while multimode fiber is capable of higher overall transmission rates.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Peloton has quietly removed the unlimited free-membership tier for its app less than a year after it debuted.
• Meta-owned social network Threads is finally testing a “Recent” filter to sort search results based on the most recent posts.
• Meta aannounced in a blog post that later this year it will be launching a new education product for Quest to position its VR headset as a go-to device for teaching in classrooms.
• The 2024 WNBA Draft is in the books, and, as expected, the Indiana Fever selected Caitlin Clark with the No. 1 overall pick. See all the picks here.

Happy Monday & Happy Tax Day! We hope you’ve successfully filed your taxes – and that they weren’t too complex. We hope you have a great week!

In This Issue: Spring Cleaning 🧼 | Cable Raceway | Understanding HDMI Types & Specifications | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Spring Cleaning 🧼

Happy Monday!

Happy Tax day! Just kidding, who loves taxes!? (Well maybe the folks at the IRS).

This weekend was a Spring cleaning weekend. It’s amazing how much junk we’ve accumulated over the years and it feels great to get rid of it. While the kids enjoyed the warm weather outside, my wife and I took some time to get some much-needed cleaning done. We’re still not done, and we’ll probably spend another few weekends cleaning up and organizing.

It is a bit of a chore at first, but at the end of the day, it feels great to get rid of some clutter and see all the progress that we’ve made. Do you Spring clean or is that just an old-fashioned traditional thing that folks like me still keep alive?

Cris

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Product Spotlights & Updates

Cable raceways are used to route, conceal, and protect cables. They are surface-mounted systems that usually run along the perimeter of walls in homes or offices, however, they can also be mounted on any other flat surface! These raceways can also be used to hide and organize exposed cables to free up the area around you for a cleaner look. This raceway forms a physical pathway for cables and protects them against corrosion, humidity, heat, and other physical threats.

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Learning Center Article – Understanding HDMI Types & Specifications

High-definition multimedia interface (HDMI) is something that almost all of us recognize. It’s the de facto cable used to play video — especially for anything involving high-definition.

HDMI has been around for more than 20 years, and almost everyone has experience with it. It’s a plug-and-play type of cable, and you probably have one or more of these cables connected to a TV (or more) in your home.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Adobe released its artificial intelligence assistant through a monthly subscription plan starting at $4.99.
• Spotify has over 100 million tracks available for listeners, and the streaming audio company is increasingly investing in AI to personalize song recommendations. It recently launched AI DJ aims to help listeners move out of their comfort zone and into new music.
• Tesla CEO Elon Musk shared that the company is reducing the price of its Full Self-Driving, or FSD, package by half to $99 a month.
• Airchat is a new social media app that encourages users to “just talk.” Read more here.

Happy Friday! We hope you’ve had a great week and are looking forward to a great weekend. Do you have any exciting plans?

In This Issue: Driving Lessons Anyone?! | Cisco 7942G Two-line Unified IP Phone | Alternatives to Rack Mount Kits | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Driving Lessons Anyone?!

Happy Friday, folks!

It’s been a while since I shared an update about my daughter’s journey to becoming a driver. She’s had her Learners Permit for a while now and loves to get behind the wheel! Being the compassionate dad I am (said with a hint of sarcasm), I have her drive down roads she hasn’t driven on before. It forces her to trust her training, process all road signs, and pay attention to everything.

We’re now tackling the challenge of night driving, as the state of Georgia requires 6 hours of driving after dark. Recently, I had her drive down some back roads, and we ended up on a road where the white line at the edge was non-existent. And did I mention that it was dark? Despite these challenging conditions, she did a fantastic job. She navigated this road well, even with cars going in the opposite direction (which makes seeing the center line nearly impossible to see).

This experience reminds me of a delegation process that shows how to transfer something to another person. It contains four steps:

• Direction Phase – I Do. You Watch.
• Coaching Phase – I Do. You Help.
• Collaboration Phase – You Do. I Help.
• Empower Phase – You Do. I Watch.

Steps 2 & 3 are impractical when driving a car. Although, I sometimes wish my car had a brake pedal on the passenger side. 😀 However, when you need to train someone else on something, this process is a simple yet practical way to teach them how to do it and instill confidence in the person! It’s a method that can be applied to various situations, making it a powerful tool for empowerment.

In what ways have you helped teach someone how to drive?

Thanks,
Chris

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Product Spotlights & Updates

If you handle a lot of calls at your workplace, the Cisco 7942G Two Line Unified IP Phone, is a great way to stay on top of your clients’ needs. This Voice over Internet Protocol phone is powered through Ethernet instead of a landline and comes with two Ethernet ports. It includes a gray LCD display that allows you to see who is calling and manage multiple calls at once. Take advantage of frequent software upgrades and features such as speakerphone settings, headset ports, and a phone directory.

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Learning Center Article – Alternatives to Rack Mount Kits

In server settings, it’s common to use standardized racks to hold and house all of the equipment. These racks are made strong and stable. They allow you to stack all of your devices in ways that support the task and configuration at hand, and they provide safe conditions that also help you manage heat and airflow.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Students applying to Harvard College for fall 2025 admission will be required to submit standardized test scores, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences announced on Thursday. This new policy will be applied to the Class of 2029 admissions cycle and will be formally assessed at regular intervals.
• Buffalo Wild Wings opened its 100th Go location, which are smaller than its traditional sports bars and limited to delivery and takeout orders.
• NASA’s impressive Mars helicopter Ingenuity stumbled upon an ‘otherworldly’ site as it made its way through space over the Red Planet. Read more here.
• Apple shares climbed 4.3% on Thursday to a share price of $175.04. It is Apple’s best day since May 5, 2023.