Ring of six copper thieves caught in Southern California

Fueled by high prices for scrap metal, copper wire theft is a problem around the world. Recently, Southern California seems to be a hotbed for copper wire thefts with a number of arrests in the last few months.

In mid-June, a ring of six thieves was arrested for stealing thousands of pounds of copper wire. The case began when a San Bernardino County sheriff’s deputy noticed a suspicious man near a vacant building. After deputies and local police officers searched the building, they interrupted a copper wire theft in progress and arrested the man. They also arrested a woman hiding in the bushes outside the building. During the investigation, deputies discovered evidence leading them to believe a copper-theft ring was being run out of a nearby house. When they went to the house, police arrested two men fleeing on foot and two women hiding in the house. In the house, they found several thousands pounds of copper wiring.

You know you’re in IT if…

You know you’re in IT if:

…you sleep upright in an IT cabinet.

…you’ve used a server to warm your coffee.

…you still use CRT monitors.

Have something better? Finish the sentence for a chance to win great prizes, including: Apple iPad®, Black Box Gift Certificate, Deluxe Gadget Kit, Laser Light, and more. We are giving away 40 prizes to the people who submit the funniest or most original endings to the sentence:

You know you’re in IT if…

Enter now! Hurry, contest ends July 30th, 2012.

*NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN. Promotion begins on or about June 21, 2012 at 12:01 a.m. ET and ends on July 30, 2012 at 11:59:59 p.m. ET. Open only to legal U.S. residents of the fifty (50) United States and D.C. who are 18 years of age or older. Click here to see Official Rules for how to enter, additional eligibility restrictions, prize descriptions/restrictions/ARVs, and complete details. Void where prohibited.

Please vote for us in the 2012 #SocialMadness Contest!

Black Box has been selected to participate in the 2012 Social Madness Contest held by The Business Journals! More than 4,000 companies nationwide are participating. On June 19th, that field will be narrowed to exactly 1,032 companies — eight companies in each of the three divisions: small, medium, and large.

We need your help! Please support us by voting for Black Box (under the large companies category). Our goal for the first round is to finish in the top eight. We are currently in 7th place. Why should you vote for us? Read about what we do and why we should win in our Social Madness Company Spotlight.

You can also help us by following us on Twitter and LinkedIn, and/or “liking” our page on Facebook. Thank you for voting and please spread the word!

4 easy ways to a greener network

Data centers consume a great deal of power, so one of the most effective things you can do to reduce your data center’s costs is to increase its energy efficiency. Building and certifying a green data center can be well worth it if you’re embarking upon new construction, but most of us are working with existing networks and are looking for ways to make existing networks more energy efficient. Fortunately, there are ways to make your data network greener with minimal disruptions to its operation.

1. Look for Energy-Efficient Ethernet (EEE) devices.
When you add new equipment, look for Ethernet devices that meet the 802.3az Energy-Efficient Ethernet standard. This new standard can reduce power consumption by 50% or more by scaling down power during periods of low data activity. These new energy-efficient switches, NICs, and routers are totally backwards compatible with older equipment, so they work seamlessly.

2. Take advantage of remote power management.
Remote power managers are devices that enable you to remotely power down unused equipment over your network—for instance, internal company servers during nights and weekends—saving both the power used to run the equipment and the associated cooling costs. Set the power manager to automatically shut down and restart at pre-set intervals or power down manually; either way you save energy.

Most remote power managers also monitor power consumption, alert you when circuit breakers are tripped, and enable you to reboot network devices, making them an invaluable addition to a network manager’s arsenal.

New Digital Signage & Video Distribution Design Guide

We recently launched our new, FREE Digital Signage & Video Distribution Design Guide. This comprehensive resource will help you plan and provision your end-to-end signage network or complete video distribution system.

The 76-page guide will help you choose the latest technology and compatible parts for your system, whether you’re considering digital signage for a small or medium business, or planning a fully integrated signage and video distribution system for a corporate, healthcare, or education environment.

The guide spotlights our range of award-winning digital signage platforms, as well as our full suite of AV infrastructure products, including AV extenders, splitters, switches, converters, and scalers, plus solutions for sharing multimedia wirelessly in meeting rooms.

For help choosing a digital signage platform or an AV distribution solution, speak to a Black Box Digital Signage Success Manager today at 800-355-8003.