Have You Got Gremlins In Your IT System? Show Them To Us For The Chance To Win An Apple iPad!

Grem-lin. n. A maker of mischief.

We’ve all experienced the mischievous creatures known as gremlins at some point in our lives and many of us will have the unfortunate pleasure of seeing their troublesome ways at least once a week when we turn the TV on and the picture doesn’t come through properly or when the favourite film is put into the DVD player and it does nothing but spin the DVD around, even though it’s been watched numerous times before.

But for businesses, some of the most annoying gremlins are the ones who cause problems and disruption within the company’s IT system.

They enter networks and storage appliances, causing problems with e-mails and servers, preventing both internal and external communications from working as they should.

They find their way into software and databases, encouraging faults that can cause headache after headache for everyone from the end user to the IT department.

And often most annoyingly of all, they can turn a healthy looking IT budget into an empty purse in a matter of minutes, as their antics require the resources of the full IT department to resolve, with many instances meaning new equipment needs to be purchased and more preventative measures put into place to try and stop the gremlins striking again in the future.

Fortunately, Hitachi Data Systems have a range of products aimed at stamping out IT gremlins, including Hitachi IT Operations Analyzer, systems monitoring software which allows you to react to issues quickly and efficiently and to show just how comical the gremlins can be, Hitachi Data Systems are currently running a competition whereby you can win a personalised Apple iPad by sending in your photos of the gremlins in your company’s IT system.

And for those of you who are thinking that you never actually get to see the little mischief makers, the idea behind the competition is that you create your interpretation of your IT gremlins out of moulding clay.

Whether they’re tall or short, slim or overweight, particularly ugly or cute and unassuming, all you have to do is produce your own IT gremlin – or gremlins! – out of moulding clay, take a photo and send it direct to rachel.taylor@hds.com and if your gremlin wins, there’ll be an Apple iPad coming your way.

You can find out more about Hitachi IT Operations Analyzer and their current competition on the website – http://www.hds-customerevents.com/AnalyzerTrial/.

N.B. This post was first published on the dedicated Hitachi blog on 28 March 2011.