IT Devices & Peripherals
We provide various kinds of IT hardware and software, including installation services, to small-size, medium-size and large-size companies. We have customers in many industries, who use IT solutions to help increasing their employees’ productivity and efficiency. Since we are a reseller of multi-vendor products, we can choose and propose appropriate products that fit to each working environment, such as 24-hours continuously operating capability, durability for manufacturing environment, flexibility for future upgrades, etc. Our services include not only on-site delivery, installation, after-sales support, but also financial services such as leasing or rental programs.
The key features of the Commercial PC & Notebook are stylish-looking and normally built with strong materials. They are also equipped with data security solutions, and have more feature settings as compared to the consumer-type PC & Notebook. There are also many options for after-sales services to fit various kinds of corporate users’ requirements.
Industrial Computer is a type of computer designed for industrial environment, which is typically dusty and high temperature. Even though it does not have a cooling fan installed inside, its high-efficient cooling system allows it for widely used in many industries.
Due to its Design for use in industrial environments and outdoor conditions such as extremely low or high temperatures, dusty environment or high-humidity environment, electrical instability, it can continuously operate in such harsh environments. Spare parts of an industrial computer are normally kept for the long-term support of around 5 – 8 years.
The key differences between the Industrial PC and Office PC are shown below
- Temperature: An industrial PC can still operate even at temperature above 45 degree Celsius, while an office PC normally operates at temperature up to 35 degree Celsius.
- Dust: The cooling fan sucks dust from outside; an industrial PC is normally equipped with an air-filter to trap dust, so the flow of cleaner air gets through. An office PC has no air-filter installed to trap dust.
- Vibration: Inside an industrial PC, hard-disk drives are mounted on rubber shock-absorbers to better reduce vibration.
- Humidity: In the high-humidity, dirty & wet environment, an office PC may not operate properly.
- Power supply: In manufacturing, the AC power sources might not be stable, an office PC is weak to spike, surge, transient and noise, while an industrial PC normally can better operate in power instability environment.
- EMI: An industrial PC is normally designed based on international standards to prevent electromagnetic interference.
- IP (Ingress Protection): This index shows the ability to prevent incoming harmful things either solid or liquid. After the character IP, the first number indicates the ability to protect against solid, and the second number indicates the ability to protect against liquid.
- Expandability: An industrial PC has more choices of expand slots and interface cards
- 24x7 Operability: An industrial PC can continuously operate 24 hours without shutting down.
- Long term support: An industrial PC model has a long life-cycle, normally 5 to 10 years, and its spare parts are normally kept to support longer than an office PC model.
- Less downtime: An industrial PC is designed for easy maintenance with basic tools, so it is required shorter repair time.
There are many types of industrial PC – Panel-type, Desktop-type, Wallmount-type and Rackmount-type.
Here are typical uses for an industrial PC.
- Collection of measuring or counting statistical data from process control or from automation control equipment.
- Use as a stand-alone controller or as a network controller.
- Use as a conveyor controller or a motion controller.
- Integration with production control system.
- Integration with factory automation system.
Workstation is a kind of personal computer, which is much faster and has better performance than a normal office computer. It is normally used in many professional applications such as engineering, architecture, and graphic design. Workstation was invented at the same time with the UNIX operating system, and the leading workstation manufacturers were Sun Microsystems, HP, DEC and IBM.
Compared with a normal office PC, a workstation is built with higher-quality components and materials, so it is more durable and can operate 24-hours continuously without any problem. Most workstations use Core Intel Xeon processor CPU to get high and stable performance, use RAM ECC (Error Correction Code) so that they do not result in a delay or backlog occurred when working long time. For storage units, they normally use SCSI/SAS type hard disk drive with RAID system, and they also support hot-swap removability. Power Supply is a premium grade that can supply stable power, and some workstation models have another unit of power supply for redundancy. Besides, a video card or graphics card with NVIDIA Quadro and AMD FirePro Enterprise-grade, are used for durability and optimal performance for some specialized professional software.
This is a type of computer peripheral which expands the usage of existing computers, allowing more simultaneous users without dropping performance. By reducing the internal key components, thin client or zero client is cheap, easy to maintain, and durable.
Benefits of Thin Client / Zero Client
- Lower cost of hardware maintenance
- Less time and IT resources to operate and support clients
- With the capability of centralized control of all clients, security policy and compliance can be effectively enforced, and user-behavior or user-productivity can also be monitored.
- Old hardware, in which spare parts cannot be easily obtained and costs are high, can be replaced with thin client or zero client using VDI technology.
- Less time to install client software, all thin clients or zero clients can access all applications and resources at the host (or server), which can normally support up to 30 clients per host.
- Many thin client or zero client models are quite small in size, and can be mounted behind a LCD monitor, so the space of working desk can be saved significantly.
- Less power consumption, while a normal office PC consumes around 350W– 450W, a thin client or zero client consumes only around 5W.
Barcode Scanner Barcode scanner is a device used to read data in various barcode formats, and then convert the data into information that can be understood by computers. Barcode scanners can be classified into two major types – portable barcode scanners and mounted or fixed-position scanners.
The functionality of a barcode scanner includes:
- Accurately find the elements of bars and spaces.
- Specify the width of bars and spaces.
- Classify the barcode data read.
- Compare element widths with a pre-defined barcode table.
- Verify the Start/Stop characters, in case of reverse-direction read.
- Verify the Quiet Zones at both sides of the barcode.
- Confirm the Check characters.
Here is a brief summary of how a barcode scanner works:
- The scanner beams onto the targeted barcode.
- The reflected beam was captured by the scanner’s sensor.
- The scanner converts the data from the reflected beam to electrical signals, based on the amount of light reflected.
- The scanner, then, transforms the electrical signals into information that can be used for further steps.
Portable Barcode Scanner
Most portable barcode scanners have internal memory to store the captured data, and since they are normally light-weight, so it is convenient to bring this type of scanner to read data at remote locations.
Fixed-position Barcode Scanner
Mounted or Fixed-position barcode scanners are normally used at the sides of a conveyor to automatically capture data on products or packaging moving along with the conveyor system. Sometimes, this type of scanner is integrated into equipment, which is a part of conveyor system. Another major application of this scanner type is department store’s or supermarket’s cashier desk, in which a scanner is embedded into the desk.
This type of printers is normally used to print out barcode stickers, labels or tags, which will be attached to products or packages before shipping or moving to next processes. Barcode printers can be classified into two types – Thermal-transfer type and Direct-thermal type.
The thermal-transfer printer requires a ribbon, filled with ink, to print out barcodes by getting through a thermal print head. There are 3 major types of ribbons:
- Wax Ribbon – the cheapest type, but not durable to scratch
- Wax-Resin Ribbon – more durable to scratch
- Resin Ribbon – the most expensive type, but extremely durable
The Direct-thermal printer does not use a ribbon, it use the heat at the print head to directly print barcodes onto stickers or labels. This printer type requires specific types of stickers or labels, which are coated with special chemicals.
Mobile computer or handheld computer is a portable computing device, usually installed with Microsoft Windows CE OS or Microsoft Windows Mobile OS. Due to its familiar Windows-based OS, it is normally easy-to-use and widely applied in many applications such as inventory management, sales management, logistic management, retails, manufacturing process management, etc.
Printer is a peripheral device used to convert an electronic file of a document to produce hardcopy of the document. Connections between a printer and a computer can be either via USB cable, LAN, WLAN, or Internet. Basically, there are four main types of printers – laser printer, ink-jet printer, dot-matrix printer, and plotter.
- Laser printer (or Toner-based printer) is a printer that uses the same technology as that of a copier. A laser beam is used to create characters or images on paper, so it results a high-quality printing. Compared with the ink-jet printer, the laser printer is faster, and gives better printing quality – i.e. higher resolution and more sharpness.
- Ink-jet printer works by spraying ink into tiny droplets onto paper to print characters or images. Compared with the dot-matrix printer, the ink-jet printer gives better printing quality, especially for complicated images with many details.
- Dot-matrix printer uses its print head to make impact on paper through an ink-ribbon, this type of printer has been popular because of its low-price and acceptable printing quality. But its disadvantages include the noisy during printing out, black & white printing only, and longer time to print as compared to ink-jet printer and laser printer.
- Plotter is the most expensive type of printer, it uses internal pens to write characters and images on paper, and it is commonly used for engineering or architectural drawings.
All types of color printers, either laser printers or ink-jet printers, basically use four color-cartridges – black, yellow, blue (cyan) and magenta – to process the mixings to get the required colors for printing out. The newer models of laser printers and ink-jet printers have multi-functions capability such as copier, scanner, and fax integrated into the same unit, and they are widely used at home and office.
Projector is a visualizing tool, mainly used for presentation to a large group of audiences. Most projects can support input from various sources such as computers, VCD/DVD players etc. Projectors have been widely used many organizations in both government sectors and private sectors. Recently, due to its lower prices, projectors are also becoming popular for Home Entertainment as well.
Currently, there are two types of projectors – LCD project and DLP project.
- LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) project is ideally suitable for Home Entertainment or for small-size meeting rooms. Compared with the other type of projector, the LCD projector gives more natural color tone, more image sharpness, and brighter image.
- DLP (Digital Light Processing) project is used for big conference rooms, and suitable for presentation of high contrast images, graphs, tables, etc. This type of projector is normally built with high quality components; it is light-weight and has a long life-time.
UPS stands for "Uninterruptible Power Supply" which is used to supply power continuously to electronic and electrical equipment, as well as to protect potential damages to equipment from the instability of main power supply. In case of power outage or voltage fluctuation, UPS can automatically stabilize its supplying voltage to safely supply power to equipment.
Basically, UPS supplies a part of incoming AC power directly to equipment and coverts the other part into DC power, which is stored into its battery-cells. When the main power sources fails, UPS will convert the DC power from its battery into AC power and supply it to equipment. Some types of high-end UPS such as “True-On-Line type” does not supply incoming AC power directly to equipment, but always converts AC power to DC power, stores it into battery, and converts it back to AC power again in order to supply to equipment. This gives a highly stable amplitude and sine wave of AC power.
Microsoft has a software license purchasing program suitable for small & medium businesses, called open license program, which can be purchased from Microsoft’s authorized dealers. Microsoft also provides a convenient tool on its web-site for an organization to easily check and manage its rights for software licenses. In addition, open license program also offers special pricing for academic institutes, charity organizations, as well as government agencies.
There are 3 types of open licenses – open business license, open volume license and open value license – which have been designed to fit the needs of different organizations.
Open Business License
This license type is a good choice for organizations that plan to purchase at least 5 licenses; volume discount will be offered approximately 3% to 27% depending on the quantity. Additional licenses can be purchased at any time within 2 years under the original contract coverage.
Open Business
This license type is a good choice for organizations that plan to purchase at least 5 licenses; volume discount will be offered approximately 3% to 27% depending on the quantity. Additional licenses can be purchased at any time within 2 years under the original contract coverage.
Open Volume License
This license type is ideal for organizations that plan to purchase big amount of licenses at one time, since the price per license is cheaper than the open business license. Licenses are classified into product groups, and each product group is tagged with point. A minimum 500 points in the same product group must be purchased at one time for the first purchase. Price per license depends on the quantity of purchase, and the contract will also last for 2 years.
Open Value License
The license type offers the most flexible purchasing options; it is suitable for organizations that plan to purchase licenses as well as software assurance (SA). Under the open value license contract, the payment can be divided into yearly payment for 3 years. So, it is easy to control the cost of software licenses during the contract period.
Microsoft also has other types of licenses, which can be purchased to fit each organization’s requirement.
FPP License / Japanese Version
FPP stands for “Full Package Product”, this license type comes with COA (Certificate of Authenticity) which means that the license right can be transferred to new hardware.
OEM License / Japanese Version
The license type is sold to computer manufacturers, and it is then installed into hardware and re-sold bundled together with hardware, so end-users cannot buy OEM license separately. OEM license cannot be transferred to other hardware.
AutoCAD is a computer aided drafting/design (CAD) software with a capability of working in both two-dimensions and three-dimensions. Autodesk is the company that invents AutoCAD, which is the most popular professional CAD software and widely used for engineering and architectural design works for various industries around the world. AutoCAD has many powerful tools which can help designers to easily create three-dimensional models, and simulate the models in various view angles. AutoCAD is also a good choice for design works that require high-resolution and high-precision models. AutoCAD has been continuously developed, and its latest version (AutoCAD 2010) is the 25th version, new features and improvements have always been added to each new version.
Adobe offers a broad line of software solutions available for companies and professionals with creativity, Adobe enables its users to be more creative. Users can benefit from high-quality publish work with reliable and secure content. Currently, Adobe products include Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign, which are standards for the graphics industry. And, with the Acrobat, Adobe has created a platform, that is also recognized as an international standard, to simply and securely share data.
Minitab was developed by a group of statistical scholars more than 30 years ago, and is now packaged software used to process statistical data and can operate on Microsoft Windows OS. Minitab inputs statistical data, process them, and show the results in numbers or graphs as required. There are 3 main reasons why Minitab becomes popular:
- It has a capability of processing complex data (Complexity)
- Results from the data processing are accurate and precise (Accuracy)
- It has an ability to process data quickly and repeatable (Repeatability)
With cooperation with our financial partners, we can also provide leasing or rental services to end-users as an alternative way to acquire new equipment to help driving business forward. This allows the flexibility on asset investments for any size of organization, and our financial partners can also assist and recommend on appropriate leasing or rental program to fit each organization’s requirement for short-term, medium-term or long term contracts. Besides, end-users still can get the benefits of the standard warranty and on-going support by the original equipment vendors.
Implementation of the equipment used in information systems – both hardware and software – can also be provided by our own professional team and some of our qualified professional business partners. We have expertise in various IT fields; each team has knowledge, skills and experience on implementing projects in many industries. End-users can be sure that implementation process will follow the pre-defined schedule, and the equipment or the system will be configured and setup to work correctly.
