CablesAndKits Blog

Happy Thursday CK Family! We hope you are having a great week and are looking forward to the weekend. How can we be praying for you as we close out the week?

In This Issue: The Magic of Fall 🍂 | Cisco 3560X/3750X Four-Port Gigabit Ethernet Network Module | Best Practices for Data Security in 2023 | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – The Magic of Fall 🍂

Good Morning and Happy Thursday!

I have always been a summer person. I love the sun, activities, and excitement that come with summer. But this year, I have never been so ready for fall. The beautiful changing of leaves and the sweaters are calling my name right about now! I am ready to sit outside and watch football with family and friends, plan gatherings, and decorate. I’ve even started buying fall towels and coffee mugs as if that will expedite the start of the season.

As the temperatures begin to cool, there’s a comforting nostalgia in the air. It’s that time of year when the world seems to slow down just a bit, allowing us to savor moments with loved ones and rediscover the joy of warm apple cider and hearty bowls of chili. So, here’s to embracing the magic of fall and all the cherished memories it’s bound to bring!

Joi

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Product Spotlights & Updates

When it comes to distributing fast signals across long distances, Cisco has a number of technology options available. One of them is the Cisco 3560x/3750x four-port Gigabit Ethernet module.

While it sounds like a mouthful, this module is designed to make networking approachable. It is energy-efficient, secure, and scalable.

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Learning Center Article – Best Practices for Data Security in 2023

Cybersecurity remains an impossible task. No matter how hard you work at it, there’s always someone out there with a new idea that you just couldn’t anticipate, and sometimes, that leads to serious security issues.

The good news is that when you stay on top of trends, you can beat emerging data center security threats without having to devote every last moment and penny to the problem.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Zoom announced a new AI companion tool for its video conferencing platform. The tool will provide features like meeting summaries, highlights, and coaching across Team Chat, Meetings, Phone, Email and Whiteboard.
• Apple has struck a deal with Arm through 2040 and “beyond,” Arm said in a SEC filing on Tuesday. Arm is set to debut on the Nasdaq stock exchange in the coming weeks at a total valuation that could be as high as $52 billion, which would be the biggest technology IPO this year.
• Comcast and Disney have modified their agreement to officially begin the process of deciding Hulu’s future ownership to late September. Comcast owns 33% of Hulu after reaching a deal with Disney five years ago that initially was set to run through January 2024.
• Tesla plans to install 20,000 electric vehicle charging stations across 2,000 Hilton properties in the U.S., Mexico and Canada beginning next year. The goal of the move is that it will help Tesla remove a barrier to adoption and help Hilton reattract business customers.

Put the Geico commercial on repeat because it’s Hump Dayyyyyyyyy! Cheers to a great rest of the week ahead.

In This Issue: Football Adventures, Upsets, and NFL Kickoff Excitement! | CAT6 Ethernet Patch Cables, Easyboot | North-South and East-West Traffic Explained | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Football Adventures, Upsets, and NFL Kickoff Excitement!

Good morning and Happy Wednesday!

I hope everyone has had a great week so far and that you are looking forward to a great and restful weekend ahead.

Last week and this past weekend was quite the adventure. We traveled up to Ohio to visit my brother, see his school, and watch his first-ever college football game. It was a blast! It was a bit of a different experience for me as I went to a school that is quite a bit larger than his school is – so the overall game day and game experience was quite the opposite of what I was used to, but was still fun!

In between visiting my brother and adventuring around the area, we also enjoyed some good college football! Talk about some upsets and some GOOD games. I went to school at East Carolina University (ECU), so I was pretty proud of how they played against Michigan in the Big House! What games were you most impressed with or shocked by?

Cheers to another weekend of football coming up and the NFL season kicking off tonight! Make sure your fantasy line-up is set.

Ashley

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Product Spotlights & Updates

Our Cat6 Easyboot Ethernet cables make it simple for you to manage your Ethernet cabling with a tabbed boot which makes it easy to connect or disconnect the cable in hard-to-reach, tight, high-density situations. CablesAndKits CAT6 cables conform to the standards both network administrators and end users rely on for conformity and functionality.

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Learning Center Article – North-South and East-West Traffic Explained

When you design a network, you want endpoint devices to be able to reach the internet. But, you often need devices inside your network to be able to communicate with each other easily and freely.

Those two ideas form the foundation of north-south and east-west networking traffic. If you take a minute to learn a little more about these concepts, you’ll see how they can help you with network design and security.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• The NFL season begins tonight with the Kansas City Chiefs playing the Detroit Lions. More football games will be streamed exclusively on services such as ESPN+ this year than ever before. Media companies are offering more exclusive content in hopes of locking in long-term customers.
• Apple has acquired BIS Records, a 50-year-old Swedish record label with a focus on classical music, as part of its continuing efforts to attract classical music fans. They will fold it into its Apple Music Classical and Platoon music services.
• Tropical Storm Lee is expected to rapidly intensify into a hurricane in the Atlantic Ocean by this weekend.
• The U.S. Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, has arrived in Kyiv with plans to have meetings with key Ukrainian officials, including President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba.

Happy Tuesday! Today we say “Hold the toppings!” and celebrate National Cheese Pizza Day. Order up or bake up your own cheese pizza to celebrate! 🍕

In This Issue: Embracing the Fall Spirit | Cisco Nexus 9332 & 9372 Fan | What is Spine-Leaf Architecture? | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Embracing the Fall Spirit

Good Morning & Happy Tuesday!

I hope everyone enjoyed the long Labor Day weekend! It was so nice to see college football back on TV, and we even got to enjoy some cooler morning temperatures over the weekend which really made it feel like a true kickoff to Fall! Even though I know we’ll have plenty more days that feel like Summer, I’m excited to start pulling out some Fall decorations and maybe even baking a few Fall/pumpkin treats soon.

My nieces and nephew have expressed interest in baking recently so I’ve been saving some recipes for us to try baking together. I’ll be sure to share if we make anything that’s a hit!

Hope everyone has a great week!

Rebecca

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Product Spotlights & Updates

Designed to keep Nexus switches nice and cool this port-side exhaust fan module, blue in color to indicate forward airflow, is used to optimize airflow in the Nexus 9332 and 9372.

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Learning Center Article – What is Spine-Leaf Architecture?

In data centers, networking is always pushing the limits of data rates and low latency. At the same time, redundancy is essential to prevent very costly downtime. How do you get the best of every world?

One viable answer is to utilize a spine-leaf architecture. It can simplify your networking design, reducing the total number of switches needed while solving the problems of latency and throughput.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Steve Harwell, the lead singer of Smash Mouth, the alternative rock band known for the cheerful pop perennial “All Star,” passed away on Monday at the age of 56.
• AMC Entertainment has reported that ticket sales for Swift’s film reached $26 million, a new record for the century-old company. Previously, the highest single-day ticket sales record was held by “Spider-Man: No Way Home” with $16.9 million.
• Starting Friday, movie theaters will have a steady stream of jump scares, creepy monsters, and gore. Releases such as “A Haunting in Venice” will help fill seats while other movies move to next year as Hollywood strikes continue.
• It has been reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un may travel to Russia to meet President Vladimir Putin for discussions on a potential deal to supply Moscow with weapons for its war on Ukraine.

Happy Friday & Happy National Burnt Ends Day! Made from the delectable ends of slow-cooked barbecue brisket, burnt ends are a mouthwatering treat. Cookout anyone?

In This Issue: Labor Day | Cisco 2821 Integrated Services Router | IT Disaster Recovery Plan (IT DRP), Are You Ready? | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Labor Day

Labor Day Update:

The CablesAndKits office & warehouse will be closed on Monday, September 4th, for the Labor Day holiday.

All orders, chats, emails, and voicemails will be attended to as quickly as possible when we re-open on Tuesday, September 5th.

We hope you enjoy spending time with your family and friends this weekend…You deserve it with all of the hard work you have done this year. Please stay safe and have a great time!

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Product Spotlights & Updates

The Cisco 2800 series is a range of modular routers that provide a range of features for small to medium-sized businesses and enterprise branch offices. It is a modular router that can be configured with a variety of different WAN and LAN interface modules to support a range of networking needs.

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Learning Center Article – IT Disaster Recovery Plan (IT DRP), Are You Ready?

If the last few years have taught us anything, it’s that the world is full of surprises. Sometimes those surprises are great. Other times, they really live up to the term “disaster.”

If you are in charge of a business or organization, then you need to be able to prepare for and overcome disaster. When it comes to IT, we call this specific idea a disaster recovery plan.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• In less than 24 hours on the market, ticket sales for Taylor Swift’s Era Tour concert film have already broken records.
  Retail veteran Roz Brewer is out as Walgreens CEO after more than two years in the job.
• Millions of Charter Communications’ pay-TV customers lost Disney networks, including ESPN, amid a battle over contract fees.
• Almost a decade after purchasing WhatsApp for $19 billion, Facebook parent Meta is still trying to turn the messaging app into a big moneymaker.
• The Federal Trade Commission has reached a deal with drug giant Amgen to allow the company’s $27.8 billion purchase of Horizon Therapeutics to move forward.

Happy Tuesday & Happy Halloween! We hope you have a fun and festive day full of treats and no tricks! 👻

In This Issue: Weekend Wilderness Escape: Our Smoky Mountain Experience | 8-Outlet Smart PDU | Does Wi-Fi 6 Work With Older Devices? | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Weekend Wilderness Escape: Our Smoky Mountain Experience

Good Morning & Happy Halloween! Whether you’re going trick-or-treating with your kids, giving out candy, or just hiding out until the festivities are over, I hope you have a great time!

I just got back from an incredible weekend of camping & exploring the Smoky Mountains! My friend Jen and I run a hiking Instagram account called @georgia_hikes where we share all kinds of content related to hikes in Georgia and the Southeast. We were fortunate enough to get invited by Toyota to participate in their Destination Outdoor event this year which took place over the weekend. They provided us with a 2024 Rav4 Hybrid and we joined their team plus some other “content creators” for a weekend of camping and off-roading!

We spent the first night in Dawsonville before caravanning up to Bryson City, NC. That would normally be about a 2.5 hour drive, but we took quite a few forest service roads so it ended up being closer to 4.5 hours! The drive was gorgeous and the leaves were absolutely unbelievable!
We had plans to hike Alum Cave on Saturday morning, but by the time we got there at 8AM the parking lot was full and so was all the street parking for about 2 miles in either direction. We couldn’t believe how busy it was up there. This weekend was definitely the “Superbowl” of hiking in Smoky Mountain National Park with it being peak leaf week! Fortunately, we had already planned to hit a few other shorter hikes which we were able to do. Some exceeded expectations, others not so much!

Overall it was a fantastic weekend! We couldn’t believe the kindness and hospitality shown by the Toyota team. They set up our tents, provided more food than we could ever eat, gassed up our vehicles, and just went out of their way to make sure everyone was having a great time. Truly some of the nicest people ever! We also loved getting to meet the other content creators, most of whom were car people. We were a little bit of the odd ones out with our content being about the outdoors, but we all got along great and had a wonderful time!

Rebecca

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Product Spotlights & Updates

Created from durable metal materials, this 8-outlet PDU is the ultimate reliable power distribution unit for all of your electronic needs. This device includes 8 well-spaced outlets along with a generous 12-foot cord giving you flexibility in placement options and freeing you from the limitations of proximity to power sources. This PDU is perfect for a variety of environments including data centers, server rooms, and more.

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Learning Center Article – Does Wi-Fi 6 Work With Older Devices?

Wi-Fi 6 is the latest and greatest in Wi-Fi technology. It’s faster, handles more traffic, saves battery life, reduces interference, improves security, and more. With so many benefits, it seems like an obvious choice to upgrade, but what about your existing hardware? Does Wi-Fi 6 work with older devices?

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• The Pentagon’s Space Development Agency announced about $1.3 billion in contracts to York Space and Northrop Grumman to build communications satellites. The SDA is having the companies build 100 satellites as part of the network the agency is building, known as the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture.
• “Sesame Street” will revamp its format as its five-year deal with streaming giant Max is set to expire. It means an end to the classic show’s magazine-style format, which will be replaced with two narrative-form segments pieced together with an animated segment.
• Apple announced new PC chips, MacBook Pro laptops, and a new iMac model. The new computers, including MacBook Pro and iMac models, go on sale next week, and have the same designs as last year’s models only with new chips.
• Alibaba launched the latest version of its artificial intelligence model, as the Chinese technology giant looks to compete with U.S. rivals like Amazon and Microsoft.

Happy Wednesday! Close your eyes and picture this: Golden rays on your skin, a nice stroll along the shore, and the rhythmic melody of crashing waves. It’s National Beach Day! We hope you’re at the beach this week, but if not here are some ocean sounds you can enjoy listening to today to celebrate.

In This Issue: Family, Fun & Football | Cisco ASR 1001-X System | Benefits of Cisco 9300 Switches | News to Start Your Day

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The CK Daily – Family, Fun & Football

Happy Wednesday!

This week has been full of fun! We took our first road trip with our little guy up to Ohio to see my little brother and see him play in his first college football game. My parents as well as my Aunt and Uncle will be joining us as well, but we left a little before to give us some time to make the trip. Carter did incredible in the car, so I was very grateful for that. We stopped quite a bit to change diapers, stretch our legs, and to check out little new places along the way. I can’t wait to see my brother soon and explore his new home away from home.

To add to our adventures, last night we completed our family fantasy league draft! This is our third year keeping our league going and the competition is really heating up! We added two new family members this year bringing our league up to 10 teams. We had a Zoom call going while our draft was happening and it was so fun to watch everyone as player after player was taken off the board. Can’t wait to see what the results of the season are!

What fun have you had this week? Hope you have a great rest of the week!

Ashley

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Product Spotlights & Updates

The ASR1001-X is a part of the Cisco Aggregation Services Router (ASR) 1000 Series, which is designed for service providers and enterprise networks that require high-performance routing and services. It is a 1 rack unit (1RU) service provider edge router that is designed to support layer 3 VPN (L3VPN) services. Its compact form factor has a built-in Route Processor, Embedded Services Processor (ESP) and Shared Port Adapter (SIP) Interface Processor.

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Learning Center Article – Benefits of Cisco 9300 Switches

When you’re designing a major enterprise network, you need the best tools available. For that, you will often turn to Cisco. The brand has dominated this space for decades for a reason, and when you want the very best that Cisco has to offer, you might turn to the Catalyst 9300.

What exactly do you get from this series? Let’s take a deep dive and see.

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Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Apple on Tuesday sent out invites for its September press event. They are expected to announce the iPhone 15 and new Apple Watches. The launch will be streamed on Apple’s website.
• Tesla received a special order from the National Highway Transportation Administration in late July requiring it to provide extensive data about its Autopilot and driver monitoring systems to the agency. The auto safety regulators want to know more about a configuration for Tesla vehicles known as “Elon mode” that eliminates a so-called “nag” that normally prompts owners to keep their hands on the steering wheel.
• The center of Hurricane Idalia has hit Florida’s Gulf Coast at Category 3 strength, inflicting a big storm surge and heavy winds.
• The Biden Administration has added insulin to its list of 10 drugs for which Medicare will negotiate lower prices.